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WORKS  EDITED  BY 

JAMES    HASTINGS,   D.D. 


The  ENCYCLOPiEDiA  of  Religion  and  Ethics. 

Dictionary  of  the  Bible.    Five  volumes. 

Dictionary  of  the  Bible.    Complete  in  One  volume. 

Dictionary  of  Christ  and  the  Gospels.    Two  volumes. 

Dictionary  of  the  Apostolic  Church.    Two  volumes. 

The  Great  Texts  of  the  Bible.    Twenty  volumes. 

The  Greater  Men  and  Women  of  the  Bible.   Six  volumes. 

"The  Scholar  as  Preacher"  Series. 

The  Expository  Times.     (Published  Monthly.) 

"The  Great  Christian  Doctrines"  Series. 

Full  particulars  of  any  or  all  of  these  Works  will  be  sent  on 
application  to  the  Publishers. 


Edinburgh:  T.  &  T.  CLARK,  38  George  Street. 


THE  GREAT 
CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINES 

EDITED   BY 

JAMES  HASTINGS,  D.D. 


THE  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 


THE 


CHRISTIAN    DOCTRINE 


OF 


PRAYER 


EDITED    BY 

JAMES   HASTINGS,   D.D. 


Edinburgh:   T.  &  T.  CLARK,   38  George  Street 

1915 


//3 


PREFACE 

This  is  the  first  of  a  short  series  of  books  on  the  Great 
Christian  Doctrines.  There  is,  I  believe,  a  widespread  and 
earnest  desire  on  the  part  of  teachers  of  the  Bible  to  do  more 
than  has  lately  been  done  for  the  teaching  of  Christian 
doctrine.  The  complaint  that  doctrine  is  dry  is  due  to  the 
way  it  is  taught,  even  more  than  to  the  "  spirit  of  the  age  ". 
Anything  is  dry  that  is  disorderly  or  unreal.  In  this  volume 
the  Doctrine  of  Prayer  is  presented  in  an  orderly  sequence, 
and  contact  with  reality  is  maintained  at  every  step  by  means 
of  illustration  or  example. 

Prayer  was  chosen  as  the  subject  of  the  first  volume  of  the 
series  before  the  War  began ;  and  it  did  not  seem  necessary 
even  then  to  apologize  for  the  choice.  The  difficulties  of  the 
doctrine  are  not  few  or  trifling ;  but  every  doctrine  has  its 
difficulties,  and  we  have  come  to  some  conclusions  about 
Prayer  which  give  us  courage.  Even  before  the  War  there 
were  many  signs  of  a  new  interest  in  it  and  new  hope  from 
its  exercise.  How  these  signs  have  multiplied  is  known  to 
every  one.  This  one  thing  at  least  that  is  good  the  War 
has  done  for  us  already.  Let  us  not  miss  our  opportunity. 
Prayer  is  not  an  easy  exercise.  It  requires  encouragement, 
exposition,  and  training.     There  never  was  a  time  when  men) 


ivi544785 


viii  PREFACE 

land  women  were  more  sincerely  anxious  to  be  told  how  to 
pray.  Prayer  is  the  mightiest  weapon  in  om:  armoury,  and  if 
we  are  to  use  it  as  God  has  given  us  the  encouragement,  we 

^must  do  everything  in  our  power  to  bring  it  into  exercise. 

A  list  of  books  which  have  been  read,  and  from  some  of 
which  quotations  have  been  made,  is  given  before  each  chapter. 

JAMES  HASTINGS. 


CONTENTS 

PAOB 

I.  INTKODUCTION 1 

1.  The  Proof  of  Prayer  ....                ...  6 

2.  The  Practice  of  Prayer 8 

II.  THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER 19 

1.  Prayer  is  Desire 23 

2.  Prayer  is  Communion 30 

3.  Prayer  is  Petition 38 

III.  ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION 45 

1.  The  Address 62 

2.  Adoration 66 

IV.  CONFESSION 67 

1.  General  and  Particul-\r 70 

2.  Hopeful 76 

3.  Heartfelt 78 

4.  Desire  for  Holiness 80 

6.  Endeavour  after  New  Obedience 81 

V.  PETITION 86 

VI.  INTERCESSION 107 

VII.  THANKSGIVING 131 

VIII.  THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER 149 

1.  According  to  the  Will  of  God 151 

2.  In  the  Name  of  Christ 169 

3.  In  the  Power  of  the  Spirit 167 

IX.  PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER 175 

1.  Knowledge .        .        .        .  177 

2.  Repentance 18S 

3.  Faith,  Hope,  and  Love 186 

4.  Importunity 193 

b  ix 


CONTENTS 


X.  MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER 

1.  Preparation  . 

2.  Practice 

3.  Definiteness 

4.  humilitt 

5.  Energy  , 

6.  Patience 

7.  Service  . 


PAOK 

197 
199 
202 
205 
206 
209 
211 
212 


XI.  SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER 21T 

1.  The  Physical  and  the  Spiritual 220 

2.  The  Meaning  of  Law 224 

3.  Mind  and  Will  in  Natural  Law 228 

XII.  PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER  .        .        .        .237 

1.  Our  Self-Sufficiency 241 

2.  The  War  of  Interests 245 

3.  What  is  Man  ? 249 

4.  A  Perfect  Providence 252 

6.  The  Unchangeable  Will 259 

XIII.  THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER 265 

1.  Deliverance 268 

2.  Character 272 

3.  Power 281 

XIV.  HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER 289 

1.  Inattentiveness 291 

2.  Preoccupation 296 

3.  Doubt .298 

4.  Pride .300 

5.  Selfishness 303 

XV.  ENCOURAGEMENTS  TO  PRAYER 309 

1.  The  Name  of  God 311 

2.  The  History  of  Israel 312 

3.  The  Life  of  Christ .        .  315 

4.  The  Promises 321 

XVI.  THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER  .        .        .        .        .        .327 

1.  No  Answer 333 

2.  Deferred  Answer 337 

3.  Different  Answer 344 


CONTENTS  xi 

FAOR 

XVII.  ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER 349 

1.  Expect  Answers 852 

2.  Answers  do  Come 356 

3.  Special  Providences 357 

4.  Some  Examples 362 

(1)  Petition 362 

(2)  Intercession 368 

5.  Spiritual  Communications 372 

XVIII.  PRAYERS  TO  THE  TRINITY 377 

1.  Prayer  to  God 383 

2.  Prayer  to  God  the  Son 386 

3.  Prayer  to  God  the  Holy  Spirit 390 

XIX.  THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER 396 

1.  Fixed  Times 400 

2.  Frequent  Occasions 409 

3.  Much  Time ,        ...  414 

4.  Always 416 

XX.  THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER 426 

1.  The  Posture 427 

2.  Form  or  Freedom  .        .        .    - 432 

(1)  Extempore  Prayer 434 

(2)  Liturgical  Prayer 436 

3.  The  Length 440 

4.  The  Voice 443 


I. 

Introduction. 


Literature. 

Barbour,  R.  W.,  Thoughts  (1900). 

Brooke,  H.,  One  Faith  and  One  Family  (1907). 

Brooks,  P.,  The  Mystery  of  Iniquity  (1893). 

,,  Lectures  on  Preaching  (1903). 

Comaby,  W.  A.,  Let  us  Pray  (1910). 
Everett,  C.  C,  Theism  and  the  Christian  Faith  (1909). 
Foster,  J.  M.,  The  White  Stone  (1901). 
Green  well,  Dora,  Essays  (1867). 
Hoare,  E.,  Great  Principles  of  Divine  Truth  (1895). 
Holden,  J.  S.,  Worship,  Beauty,  Holiness. 
Horton,  R.  F.,  The  Prayer-House  of  God. 
Ingram,  A.  F.  W.,  The  Gospel  in  Action  (1906). 
„         The  Call  of  the  Father  (1907). 
Leader,  G.  C,  Wanted — A  Boy. 
Liddon,  H.  P.,  Some  Elements  of  Religion  (1873). 

„  ,,       Sermons  on  Some  Words  of  St.  Paul  (1898). 

McCann,  J.,  The  Autobiography  of  a  Soul  (1907). 
MacDonald,  G.,  Unspoken  Sermons,  ii.  (1885). 
McNabb,  V.,  Oxford  Conferences  on  Prayer  (1903). 
Peabody,  F.  G.,  Mornings  in  the  College  Chapel,  ii.  (1908). 
Robinson,  A.  W.,  in  Cambridge  Theological  Essays  (1905). 
Thomas,  H.  A.,  in  Faith  and  Criticism  (1893). 
Vaughan,  C.  J.,  Voices  of  the  Prophets  (1867). 


Introduction. 

"  In  one  shape  or  another,"  says  Bishop  Phillips  Brooks,^  "  the 
religious  question  which  gives  thoughtful  religious  people  the 
most  trouble  is  probably  the  question  of  prayer.  We  cannot 
doubt  that  it  has  always  been  so.  We  feel  sure  that  in  every 
condition  of  religion,  down  to  the  lowest,  in  which  men  are 
moved  to  supplicate  God  at  all,  the  struggle  between  the  two 
feelings,  between  the  instinct  that  God  must  hear  and  answer 
and  the  doubt  whether  God  can  hear  and  answer,  has  been 
always  going  on.  It  is  not  a  struggle  of  our  days  alone ;  it  is 
not  a  question  which  certain  peculiar  tendencies  of  our  time  have 
brought  out.  It  is  as  old  as  David  ;  nay,  as  old  as  Job,  as  old  as 
all  religion." 

Here  we  have  at  once  the  two  great  primary  facts  about 
prayer.  There  is  an  instinct  in  men  to  seek  fellowship  with  God 
in  prayer,  and  yet  it  demands  an  effort  of  the  will  to  pray. 
Round  these  two  facts  all  the  diflSculties  of  prayer  as  well  as  all 
its  advantages  may  be  said  to  gather.  Let  us  glance  at  them 
separately  before  we  begin  the  proper  subject  of  this  Introduc- 
tion, which  is  the  Proof  and  the  Practice  of  Prayer. 

1.  The  instinct  of  prayer  is  to  us  like  the  wing  of  a  bird  to  a\ 
bird  and  the  fin  of  a  fish  to  a  fish.  The  wing  of  the  bird  demands 
the  air,  the  fin  of  the  fish  demands  the  water,  the  instinct  of| 
prayer  demands  God.  Therefore  the  only  monstrosity  of  nature, 
just  as  much  a  monstrosity  as  a  wingless  bird  or  a  finless  fish, 
is  the  prayerless  man  or  woman,  because  the  deepest  and  most 
real  instinct  they  have  is  not  satisfied. 

IF  Strong  as  may  be  my  admiration  for  the  beautiful,  deeply  as 
I  may  be  stirred  by  the  strains  of  melody,  there  is  yet  another 
emotion  more  powerful  and  more  lasting  than  either  of  these,  and 

1  The  Mystery  of  Iniquity,  296. 
3 


4       CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

that  is  my  desire  for  communion  with  God  in  the  form  of  prayer. 
The  love  of  the  beautiful  may  lessen  with  the  decrease  of  my 
powers,  the  desire  for  music  may  wane  as  I  grow  decrepit,  but 
the  wish  to  pray  grows  stronger  as  the  years  are  added  to  my 
life.i 

(1)  This  instinct  is  far  older  than  Christianity  itself,  for  it  is 
the  expression  of  a  dependence  upon  God  which  in  every  age 
has  been  prominent  in  the  consciousness  and  conduct  of  men. 
Jesus  Christ  did  not  create  it.  He  found  it  already  highly 
developed;  and,  by  His  revelation  of  the  Fatherhood  of  God, 
He  directed  and  guided  it  towards  Him.  This,  indeed,  was  the 
entire  aim  of  His  redeeming  life  and  death — so  to  capture  and 
control  this  common  instinct  of  dependence  in  men  that  they 
should  become  worshipping  children  and  so  partake  of  all  the 
soul-renewing  results  of  that  worship. 

IF  Dr.  Knox,  Bishop  of  Manchester,  preaching  on  the  sands  at 
Blackpool,  told  a  story  of  a  miner  who  called  himself  an  infidel. 
One  day  in  the  mine  some  coal  began  to  fall,  and  the  man  cried 
out,  "Lord,  save  me".  Then  a  fellow-miner  turned  to  him  and 
said,  "  Ay,  there's  nowt  like  cobs  o'  coal  to  knock  th'  infidelity  out 
o*  a  man".  Yes,  men  may  try  to  keep  down  the  instinct  of 
prayer,  but  there  are  times  in  every  life  when  it  will  be  heard. ^ 

(2)  Therefore  let  us  recognize  the  fact  that  we  are  never  so 
natural  as  when  we  pray.  Over  and  over  again  we  find  that 
people  in  the  workshops  and  in  the  great  houses  of  business  in 
cities  will  almost  flout  the  man  or  woman  who  goes  regularly 
to  church  or  who  says  his  or  her  prayers.  They  point  out,  as 
they  imagine,  that  it  is  an  unnatural  thing  to  do — an  unnatural 
thing  on  a  beautiful  Sunday  afternoon  to  spend  an  hour  in  a 
house  of  prayer.  What  we  must  recognize,  in  the  first  place,  is 
this :  that  we  are  most  natural  when  we  pray,  for  if  there  is  one 
thing  certain  about  human  nature,  it  is  that  man  is  a  praying 
animal,  and  is  born  to  pray. 

IT  In  our  present  order,  there  is  no  voice  so  sweet,  so  powerful, 
so  essentially  human,  as  that  of  prayer,  none  other  so  natural  to 
a  being  like  man,  at  once  rational,  fallen,  and  redeemed.  It  is 
possible,  without  any  great  strain  upon  imagination,  to  conceive 

^  J.  MoCann,  The  Autobiography  of  a  Souly  109. 
*  G.  C.  Leader,  Wanted— a  Boy,  74, 


INTRODUCTION  5 

of  inanimate  creation  as  filled  with  praise.  It  is  easy  to  think 
of  the  winds  and  waves  in  their  restless  movement,  the  birds  in 
their  song,  the  stars  in  their  silence,  the  very  grass  and  flowers, 
as  worshipping  God  in  their  beauty  and  their  gladness.  Often 
the  air  around  us  seems  full  of  thanksgiving,  breathless  with 
adoration;  but  who,  even  in  poetry,  ever  dreamt  that  nature 
'prayed  ?  Prayer  is  the  voice  of  one  who  errs  and  loves ;  of  one 
who  sins,  and  suffers,  and  aspires  ;  it  is  the  voice  of  a  child  to  its 
father,  the  voice  of  man  to  his  God.^ 

2.  But  the  instinct  to  pray  no  more  indicates  the  prayerful 
life  than  the  musical  ear  denotes  the  accomplished  musician. 
Both  are  but  the  foundations  on  which  unremitting  endeavour 
erects  mastery.  As  the  pianist  day  after  day  sounds  forth  upon 
his  instrument  the  changes  of  his  scales  and  finger  exercises,  so 
the  master  Christian  breathes  his  daily  petitions  and  thanksgiv- 
ings, not  as  constituting  in  themselves  the  prayer  which  God 
enjoins,  but  as  the  ceaseless  exercise  which  enables  the  soul  to 
sound  celestial  harmonies. 

IT  Why  should  we  pray  ?  And,  as  we  ask  ourselves  the  question, 
I  suppose  that  the  first  answer  must  be,  "  Because  of  a  deep  in- 
herited instinct  which  has  been  trained  and  fostered  from  our 
childhood  by  those  we  love  ".  Notice,  we  must  have  the  whole 
answer.  Whether  a  child  would  pray  if  it  was  never  taught  may 
fairly  be  questioned ;  but  certainly  there  would  always  be  in  it 
that  deep  instinct  for  prayer — a  deep  instinct  which  still  remains, 
too,  in  the  minds  and  hearts  of  men  who  have  ceased  to  believe 
in  a  God ;  for  a  man  once  told  me  most  pathetically  that,  though 
all  his  faith  had  gone,  every  morning  regularly  he  practised  what 
he  called  self-reflection  to  satisfy  that  instinct  of  prayer  which  he 
could  satisfy  in  no  other  way.^ 

I. 

The  Proof  of  Prayer. 

1.  Notwithstanding  the  importance  of  prayer  in  religion  and 
life,  it  finds  little  place  in  theology.  The  largest  treatises  are  at 
one  with  the  smallest  manuals  of  systematic  theology  in  giving 
but  a  very  subordinate  place  to  the  discussion  of  its  problems,  if 

1  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays,  140. 

2  A.  F.  Winnington  Ingram,  The  Oospel  in  Action,  245. 


6        CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

they  give  anyplace  at  all.  Why  is  this?  "It  seems  to  me,'* 
says  Professor  Everett,  "  not  to  enter  naturally  and  fittingly  into 
theological  discussion.  For  prayer  should  be  simply  the  natural 
expression  of  the  spiritual  life  at  that  stage,  whatever  it  may  be, 
at  which  the  soul  finds  itself.  Whatever  the  religious  standpoint 
of  a  man  may  be,  he  should  be  left  to  himself  to  express  his 
spiritual  life  naturally.  If  his  religion  does  not  impel  him  to 
pray,  then  prayer  will  be  for  him  artificial  unless  indeed  it  be  the 
prayer  for  prayer." 

There  is  then,  properly  speaking,  no  possibility  of  one  person 
proving  to  another  that  prayer  is  of  any  value.  In  a  remarkable 
sermon  preached  to  the  Wakefield  Church  Congress  in  1886,  on 
the  "  Reasonableness  and  Efficacy  of  Prayer,"  Bishop  Reichel 
boldly  asserted  that  "  we  can  have  no  knowledge  of  the  hearing 
and  answering  of  prayer,  such  as  shall  be  capable  of  being  proved 
to  others.  All  attempts  to  demonstrate  the  efficacy  of  prayer 
must  fail."  "  But,"  he  added,  "  certainly  one  thing  may  be  said 
with  perfect  truth,  and  that  is,  that  no  one  who  has  been  in  the 
habit  of  praying  in  the  way  in  which  a  creature  ought  to  pray  to 
his  Creator,  with  the  due  measure  of  commingled  reverence  and 
awe,  will  say  that  his  doing  so  has  been  useless  and  ineffective." 

There  is  a  certain  amount  of  evidence  which  may  be  produced, 
but  the  external  evidence  for  the  success  of  particular  prayers 
may  not  be  decisive.  It  is  capable  of  being  explained  until  it  is 
virtually  explained  away.  With  our  very  limited  and  uncertain 
understanding  of  historical  antecedents,  it  is  generally  open  to  us 
to  make  several  conjectures  as  to  the  causes  which  have  led  to  an 
event;  and  consequently  it  must  always  be  difficult,  if  not  im- 
possible, to  secure  agreement  as  to  the  nature  of  the  forces  which 
have  been  at  work  in  any  specified  case.  Tests  that  at  one  time 
might  have  been  deemed  satisfactory,  at  another  would  be  dis- 
trusted and  disallowed.  Thus,  for  example,  it  may  safely  be 
predicted  that  the  hospital- ward  test  will  never  again  be  proposed, 
as  it  was  in  1872.  In  view  of  our  extending  knowledge  of  what 
can  be  effected  by  telepathy,  it  could  no  longer  be  regarded  as 
conclusive.  It  would  not  now  be  doubted  that  a  number  of 
persons  who  directed  their  thoughts  and  wishes  in  prayer  towards 
a  group  of  sufferers  might  be  the  means  of  producing  a  remark- 
able change  in  their  condition.     What  might  be  questioned  would 


INTRODUCTION  7 

be  the  inference  that  anything  more  than  human  intervention  was 
necessary  in  any  instance  to  explain  the  result. 

IF  Our  present  day  seems  full  of  question,  of  urgency  on  all 
points  connected  with  prayer.  It  seems  disposed  to  put  it  to  the 
proof,  to  ask  what  it  can  effect  or  alter  ;  it  appears  inclined,  as 
regards  this  great  subject,  to  ask  for  a  sign  from  heaven ;  but 
what  sign  can  be  given  it  but  the  sign  of  the  Son  of  Man  in 
heaven  ?  The  warfare  of  prayer  and  its  accomplishment  is  the 
warfare,  the  accomplishment,  of  the  Cross,  a  conquest  through 
apparent  defeat.  Its  work  is  one  with  that  great  effectual  Work 
in  which  its  strength  lies  wrapped  and  hidden.  It  is,  like  it,  a 
real  work  and  an  effectual  work,  though  one  of  which  the  believer, 
with  his  Lord,  must  sometimes  be  content  to  say — "  I  have 
laboured  in  vain,  I  have  spent  my  strength  in  vain,  yet  surely 
my  judgment  is  with  the  Lord,  and  my  work  with  my  God".^ 

2.  But  we  are  not  dependent  on  external  evidence.  Who  that 
has  prayed  diligently,  and  experienced  an  answer,  does  not  know 
that  that  one  experience  has  done  more  for  the  life  of  religion 
in  his  or  her  soul  than  a  great  deal  of  reading  or  thinking  ?  That 
consciousness  of  our  relation  to  God  is  a  thing  which  will  develop 
through  all  eternity ;  but  it  has  its  beginning  here,  and  the 
reason  why  God  makes  things  depend  upon  our  asking  for  them 
is  that  we  may  be  thus  educated  into  such  personal  intercourse 
with  Him  that  that  truth  of  sonship  may  never  be  merged  and 
lost  as  it  is  merged  and  lost  in  all  that  direction  of  life  which, 
unconsecrated  by  prayer,  moves  away  from  God. 

Prayer  is  reasonable  because  it  works.  How  many  men  have 
had  some  terrible  temptation,  and  have  lifted  up  their  minds  to 
God  and  prayed  for  helping  grace  in  times  of  necessity,  and  have 
felt  in  their  deepest  self  the  answer  given  in  the  strength  by 
which  they  have  been  sustained.  Or  our  light  has  been  low,  a 
flickering  taper,  a  smoking  flax ;  we  have  looked  at  little  things 
as  though  they  were  big,  and  at  big  things  as  though  they  were 
little,  and  there  has  been  no  desire  to  pray  or  move  in  the  higher 
and  outer  space  at  alL  Then  we  have  suddenly  prayed,  and,  like 
John  Wesley,  have  felt  our  hearts  "strangely  warmed".  The 
blessed  power  of  old  truths  has  been  resuscitated,  and  we  have 
waited  on  the  Lord  and  renewed  our  strength. 

*  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays,  147. 


8       CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  The  sense  of  God's  presence  brings  with  it  the  desire,  the  right, 
the  power,  to  approach  the  throne  of  grace  at  any  time,  for  any- 
thing, about  anyone.  The  more  God's  nearness  is  enjoyed,  the 
oftener  can  He  be  gone  to.  No  holy  place  need  prepare  one,  no 
service-book  need  prompt  one.  No  priest  need  lead  one,  no  saint 
or  angel  intercede  for  one.  The  "  assurance  of  God's  love  "  is  the 
great  atmosphere,  the  charter,  and  the  exemplar  of  believing 
prayer.  One  answered  prayer  is  a  greater  proof  of  God's  presence 
than  many  apologies.  God's  presence  realized  makes  one  as 
sensitive  and  tender  to  others'  needs  as  to  his  own.  No  one  can 
be  near  God  and  not  desire  forgiveness  for  his  brother  as  well  as 
himself.  And  God's  felt  presence — which  is  assurance — brings 
not  only  the  desire  for  this,  but  strong  confidence  in  asking  it.^ 

Prayer  the  Churche's  banquet,  Angel's  age, 
God's  breath  in  man  returning  to  his  birth, 

The  soul  in  paraphrase,  heart  in  pilgrimage. 

The  Christian  plummet  sounding  heav'n  and  earth ; 

Engine  against  th'  Almightie,  sinner's  towre, 
Reversed  thunder,  Christ-side-piercing  spear, 

The  six-daies- world  transposing  in  an  houre, 
A  kind  of  tune  which  all  things  heare  and  fear ; 

Softnesse,  and  peace,  and  joy,  and  love,  and  blisse, 

Exalted  manna,  gladnesse  of  the  best, 
Heaven  in  ordinarie,  man  well  drest, 

The  milkie  way,  the  bird  of  Paradise, 

Church-bels  beyond  the  starres  heard,  the  soul's  bloud, 
The  land  of  spices,  something  understood.^ 

II. 

The  Practice  of  Prayer. 

The  proof  of  prayer  is  the  practice  of  it.  The  practice  is 
everything.  However  little  we  may  be  able  to  prove  to  others 
the  efficacy  of  prayer,  we  know  that  all  is  well  if  we  pray. 

1.  But  here  is  the  difficulty.     We  know  but  we  do  not.     We 

know  that  nothing  too  glorious  can  be  claimed  for  prayer  and 

yet  we  are  slow  to  pray.     That  contrast  between  the  ideal  and 

the  actual,  which  often  impresses  us  so  painfully,   is,  perhaps, 

1 B.  W.  Barbour,  Thoughts,  29.  2  George  Herbert. 


INTRODUCTION  9 

never  more  apparent  than  when  we  come  to  make  a  comparison 
between  the  theory  and  the  practice  of  prayer.  In  theory,  prayer 
is  a  thing  sacred  and  glorious  beyond  the  power  of  words  to 
describe.  No  privilege  possible  to  men  is  worthy  to  be  put  by 
the  side  of  the  privilege  of  communion  with  God.  No  joy  can 
thrill  the  heart  like  the  joy  of  the  man  who  knows  that  he  is  in 
the  presence  of  the  Creator  and  Ruler  of  all,  and  is  conscious 
that  his  appeal  is  heard.  No  peace  can  be  so  profound  or  so  holy 
as  the  peace  which  possesses  the  minds  of  those  who  have  entered 
into  the  meaning  of  this  mystery,  and,  by  an  act  of  faith  or  in  a 
moment  of  vision,  have  claimed  for  themselves  the  unspeakable 
blessing  which  it  brings.  It  is  surely  impossible  to  say  too  much 
of  the  glory  and  honour  with  which  that  man  is  crowned,  of  the 
grace,  the  power,  the  tranquillity,  and  the  gladness,  which  have 
become  his  portion  who  has  learned  how  to  pray.  That  must  be 
acknowledged  by  all  who  have  ever  had  any  religious  instinct  or 
aspiration. 

And  yet,  when  we  consider  the  practice  of  men,  and  begin  to 
inquire  into  their  actual  experience,  we  are  apt  to  ;find  that 
prayer  does  not  by  any  means  appear  to  be  in  reality  what  it  is 
in  theory.  We  find  that  it  is  approached  as  a  duty  rather  than 
valued  as  a  privilege,  and  often  as  a  duty  not  of  the  most  attrac- 
tive kind.  Men  ought  to  pray;  and  they  pray,  or  try  to  pray, 
sometimes  with  poor  success,  because  they  ought.  But  the  time 
and  the  strength  which  are  given  to  the  work  are  given,  if  the 
truth  must  be  confessed,  but  grudgingly.  The  complaint  has 
become  common  in  our  churches  that  the  meeting  for  prayer  is 
scantily  attended,  and  that,  on  the  whole,  small  interest  is  taken 
in  it.  The  charm  of  music  may  give  to  the  service  an  attractive- 
ness in  the  eyes  of  some,  and  sermons  and  addresses  may  serve 
to  commend  it,  or  to  make  it  endurable  to  others.  But  the  mere 
praying  would  seem  to  have  little  fascination  for  many  minds. 
There  is  little  beauty  in  it  that  men  should  desire  it,  little  sacred- 
ness  in  it  that  it  should  be  held  in  honour.  It  is  counted  almost 
a  strange  thing  that  a  gentleman,  and  a  man  of  education  and 
resources,  should  frequent  prayer-meetings.  "How  odd,"  it  is 
said,  "  that  a  man  like  that  should  go  to  such  places,  when  there 
must  be  so  many  things  to  interest  and  occupy  his  thoughts,  and 
claim  his  attention."      That  a  feeling  like  this,  of  distaste  and 


10      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

almost  of  quiet  scorn  for  the  prayer-meeting,  prevails  in  many- 
quarters  will  scarcely  be  disputed. 

And  though  we  must  speak  with  greater  reserve  of  private 
prayer,  seeing  that  we  know  little  of  the  habits  of  men  in  this 
respect,  yet  there  are  not  wanting  signs  and  testimonies  that  the 
prayers  which  are  made  in  the  closet  to  the  Father,  which  seeth 
in  secret,  are  very  far  indeed  from  being  what  they  might  be 
expected  to  be,  or  from  bringing  to  those  who  offer  them  what 
they  might  be  expected  to  bring. 

2.  The  only  remedy  is  to  pray,  and  by  praying  to  encourage 
others  to  pray.  If  we  pray  sincerely  once,  we  will  pray  again. 
If  we  pray  as  we  can  to-day,  to-morrow  we  shall  pray  better. 
If  we  wait  to  pray  till  prayer  shall  be  less  difficult,  we  shall  never 
pray.  The  voice  of  God  is  calling  to  us,  "  Seek  ye  my  face ". 
That  voice  calls  to  us  in  many  ways,  in  Scripture,  in  conscience, 
in  providence,  in  every  event,  common  or  special,  glad  or  grave, 
welcome  or  sorrowful.  Let  us  see  that,  when  God  says,  "  Seek 
ye  my  face,"  we  are  ready,  every  one  to  answer  with  the 
Psalmist, "  Thy  face,  Lord,  will  I  seek  ".  There  is  a  piece  of  shrewd 
philosophy  in  the  Book  of  Proverbs  (iv.  7,  R.V.  margin),  which 
applies  to  our  learning  to  pray  successfully,  as  well  as  to  many 
other  works  and  devices  under  the  sun.  It  reads :  "  The  begin- 
ning of  wisdom  is.  Get  wisdom  ".  That  is  to  say,  in  colloquial 
English :  The  way  to  learn  to  do  a  thing  is  to  "  go  at  it ".  We 
can  learn  to  swim  only  by  getting  into  the  water  and  striking 
out.  We  can  learn  to  play  the  piano  or  violin  only  by  playing 
it.  Practice  is  the  chief  item  in  all  the  arts,  and  in  none  more 
than  in  the  art  of  prayer. 

IF  By  praying,  prayer  is  proved.  No  argument  establishes  it 
apart  from  practice,  while  the  practice  renders  argument  un- 
necessary.^ 

IT  Thou  wilt  say  that  I  speak  too  high  on  this  matter  of  prayer 
which  is  indeed  no  mastery  nor  difficulty  for  me  to  write,  but  it 
were  a  great  mastery  for  a  man  to  practise  it.^ 

H  If  I  try  to  set  forth  something  of  the  reasonableness  of  all 
prayer,  I  beg  my  readers  to  remember  that  it  is  for  the  sake  of 
action  and  not  speculation  ;  if  prayer  be  anything  at  all,  it  is  a 
thing  to  be  done  :  what  matter  whether  you  agree  with  me  or  not, 

1  R.  F.  Horton,  The  Prayer-House  of  God,  7.  » Walter  Hilton. 


INTRODUCTION  ii 

if  you  do  not  pray  ?  I  would  not  spend  my  labour  for  that ;  I 
desire  it  to  serve  for  help  to  pray,  not  to  understand  how  a  man 
might  pray  and  yet  be  a  reasonable  soul.^ 

II  Fletcher  of  Madeley,  a  great  teacher  of  a  century  and  a 
half  ago,  used  to  lecture  to  the  young  theological  students.  He 
was  one  of  the  fellow-workers  with  Wesley,  and  a  man  of  most 
saintly  character.  When  he  had  lectured  on  one  of  the  great 
topics  of  the  Word  of  God,  such  as  the  Fulness  of  God's  Holy 
Spirit  or  on  the  power  and  blessing  that  He  meant  His  people 
to  have,  he  would  close  the  lecture,  and  say,  '*  That  is  the  theory ; 
now  will  those  who  want  the  practice  come  along  up  to  my 
room  ? "  And  again  and  again  they  closed  their  books  and  went 
away  to  his  room,  where  the  hour's  theory  would  be  followed  by 
one  or  two  hours  of  prayer.^ 

3.  Of  what  does  an  act  of  prayer  consist  ?  It  consists  always 
of  three  separate  forms  of  activity  which,  in  the  case  of  different 
persons,  co-exist  in  very  varying  degrees  of  intensity,  but  which 
are  found,  in  some  degree,  in  all  who  pray,  whenever  they 
pray. 

(1)  To  pray  is,  first  of  all,  to  put  the  affections  in  motion ;  it 
is  to  open  the  heart.  The  object  of  prayer  is  the  Uncreated  Love, 
the  Eternal  Beauty — He  of  whose  beauty  all  that  moves  love  and 
admiration  here  is  at  best  a  pale  reflection.  To  be  in  His  presence 
in  prayer  is  to  be  conscious  of  an  expansion  of  the  heart,  and  of 
the  pleasure  that  accompanies  it,  which  we  feel,  in  another  sense, 
when  speaking  with  an  intimate  and  loved  friend  or  relative. 
And  this  movement  of  the  affections  is  sustained  throughout  the 
act  of  prayer.  It  is  invigorated  by  the  spiritual  sight  of  God, 
but  it  is  also  the  original  impulse  which  leads  us  to  draw  near  to 
Him.  In  true  prayer,  as  in  teaching,  "  out  of  the  abundance  of 
the  heart  the  mouth  speaketh  ". 

Prayer  is  the  utterance  before  God  of  emotion.  The  deep  and 
secret  emotions  of  the  heart  are  in  worship  uttered  or  poured  out 
before  God.  Thus  in  worship  we  act  on  the  invitation,  "  Pour 
out  your  hearts  before  him  ".  Now  this  applies  to  all  the  varieties 
of  true  worship.  It  applies  even  to  supplication.  A  large  pro- 
portion of  our  worship,  sometimes  too  large  a  proportion,  consists 
of  requests.     Request  is  the  lowest  form  of  worship,  for  it  turns 

1  George  MacDonald,  Unspoken  Sermons,  ii.  58. 
'  Hubert  Brooke,  One  Faith  and  One  Family,  30. 


12      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

the  thoughts  towards  self.  We  ask  that  we  may  receive,  and  that 
which  we  hope  to  receive  is  the  great  object  of  our  prayer.  But 
even  these  requests  are  all  of  them  the  expressions  of  emotion ; 
for  is  it  not  an  earnest  desire  that  prompts  them,  and  what  is  that 
desire  but  a  strong  emotion  ?  When,  e.g.,  we  pray,  "  Cleanse  the 
thoughts  of  our  hearts  by  the  inspiration  of  the  Holy  Spirit," 
does  not  the  prayer  arise  from  the  strong,  earnest  desire 
after  a  spotless  holiness,  and  is  not  that  desire  one  of  the  most 
sacred  emotions  that  the  Holy  Spirit  ever  draws  forth  from  the 
heart  of  the  regenerate  man  ?  But  if  it  applies  to  supplication  or 
request,  how  much  more  does  it  apply  to  adoration ! 

But  prayer  also  kindles  emotion.  If  love  prompts  worship, 
it  must  surely  follow  that  worship  will  kindle  love.  We  see  this 
in  a  comparison  of  Psalm  xviii.  and  Psalm  cxvi.  In  both  is  de- 
clared love  for  Jehovah,  and  in  both  is  it  connected  with  His 
worship.  But  there  is  this  difference :  in  xviii.  the  love  leads  to 
the  worship,  and  in  cxvi.  the  worship  calls  forth  the  love.  In 
xviii.  the  Psalmist  says,  "  I  will  love  thee,  0  Lord  "  (ver.  1),  and 
then  adds,  as  a  consequence  of  that  love  (ver.  3),  "I  will  call  upon 
the  Lord,  who  is  worthy  to  be  praised  " ;  whereas,  in  cxvi.  1,  he 
says,  "  I  love  the  Lord,  because  he  hath  heard  my  voice  and  my 
supplications  ".  He  loved  as  he  went  in,  but  he  loved  still  more 
as  he  came  out. 

(2)  To  pray  is,  next,  to  put  the  understanding  in  motion,  and 
to  direct  it  upon  the  highest  object  to  which  it  can  possibly  ad- 
dress itself,  the  Infinite  God.  In  our  private  prayers,  as  in  our 
public  liturgies,  we  generally  preface  the  petition  itself  by  naming 
one  or  more  of  His  attributes.  Almighty  and  Everlasting  God  ! 
If  the  understanding  is  really  at  work  at  all,  how  overwhelming 
are  the  ideas,  the  truths,  which  pass  thus  before  it :  a  boundless 
Power,  an  Existence  which  knows  neither  beginning  nor  end. 
Then  the  substance  of  the  petition,  the  motives  which  are  alleged 
for  urging  it,  the  issues  which  depend  upon  its  being  granted  or 
being  refused,  present  themselves  to  the  eye  of  the  understanding. 
And  when  prayer  is  not  addressed  to  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  Him- 
self, the  fact  that  it  is  addressed  to  the  Father  through  Him,  and 
in  reliance  on  His  merits  and  mediation,  opens  upon  Christian 
thought  the  inmost  mysteries  before  the  Eternal  Throne.  And 
thus  any  common  act  of  real  prayer  keeps,  not  the  imagination. 


INTRODUCTION  13 

but  the  understanding,  occupied  earnestly,  absorbingly,  under  the 
guidance  of  faith,  from  first  to  last. 

The  first  ingredient  in  prayer  is,  not  intelligence,  but  move- 
ment of  the  spirit — of  the  soul.  The  raw  material  of  prayer,  so 
to  put  it,  is  a  vague  aspiration  of  the  soul  towards  its  true 
Object. 

"  Like  as  the  hart  desireth  the  water-brooks, 

So  longeth  my  soul  after  thee,  O  God. 

My  soul  is  athirst  for  God ; 

Yea  even  for  the  living  God. 

When  shall  I  come  to  appear  before  the  presence  of  God  ? " 

The  motive  of  this  movement  is  a  sense  of  need,  a  sense  of  weak- 
ness, a  sense  of  dependence.  It  is  perfectly  compatible  with  very 
shadowy  perceptions  of  God ;  it  is  the  cry  of  a  child  towards  its 
parent,  whom  it  sees  only  indistinctly  in  the  distance  or  in  the 
twilight ;  it  is  an  impulse,  an  enthusiasm,  an  emotion  ;  it  is  a 
breathing,  an  aspiration.  The  raw  material  of  prayer  is  not  its 
intellectual  element ;  it  is  its  element  of  impulse,  of  love,  of  moral 
movement,  vigorous  and  resolute  in  its  endeavour,  yet  vague 
and  indeterminate  as  to  its  course  and  its  Object.  Undoubtedly, 
very  earnest  prayer  is  often  compatible  with  a  slight  exercise  of 
the  understanding.  "  I  will  pray  with  the  spirit "  is  a  resolution 
which  can  be  carried  into  practice,  if  it  stands  alone,  more  easily 
than  "  I  will  pray  with  the  understanding,"  if  it  stands  alone. 
The  understanding  alone  does  not  pray — it  only  thinks ;  and 
thought  is  a  very  different  thing  from  prayer.  Thought  about 
God  or  about  ourselves  is  not  of  itself  that  inward  movement 
towards  God  which  is  at  bottom  an  impulse  from  on  high,  and 
which  is  the  first  and  the  essential  step  in  real  prayer.  The  un- 
instructed,  the  young,  the  very  ill,  the  almost  despairing,  the 
broken-hearted,  can  say,  after  the  Apostle,  when  they  can  say 
little  else,  "I  will  pray  with  the  spirit ". 

But  although  the  understanding  cannot  give  the  first  impulse 
to  prayer,  it  can  supply  guidance  to  it.  It  is  very  needful,  if  the 
original  impulse,  which  is  the  essence  of  prayer,  is  to  be  brought 
into  shape  and  made  permanently  serviceable  to  the  soul.  The 
original  energy  of  prayer  is  supplied  by  emotion  ;  its  regulation 
is  secured  by  the  understanding,  that  is,  the  understanding 
illuminated  by  Divine  grace.     Without  this  understanding,  the 


14      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

spirit  of  prayer  is  like  fluid  metal  which  runs  into  irregular  forms 
from  want  of  a  mould.  Without  the  understanding,  the  spirit  of 
prayer  is  like  great  natural  ability  which  is  wasted  or  misused 
from  want  of  good  training.  Without  the  understanding,  devo- 
tional impulse  will  easily  pass  into  boisterous  and  even  irreverent 
rhapsody,  or  shrink  back  to  the  lifeless  monotony  of  mere  form. 
The  understanding  takes  the  devotional  impulse  or  spirit  in 
hand,  rouses  it  to  jealous  and  vigorous  consciousness,  bids  it 
consider  who  He  is  who  is  the  real  Object  of  prayer,  what  is 
sought  of  Him,  why  He  is  applied  to  for  this  particular  benefit, 
what  are  the  fitting  steps  in  the  application. 

The  understanding  thus  secures  a  double  result.  It  introduces 
point,  purpose,  order,  into  what,  without  it,  would  be  aimless  and 
unregulated  impulse ;  and  it  does  more — it  secures  reverence.  With- 
out injuring  the  tenderness  of  the  relations  which  bind  a  living 
soul  to  its  God  and  its  Redeemer,  it  is  there  as  a  perpetual  re- 
minder of  His  Unapproachable  Majesty,  and  of  the  nothingness 
of  all  creatures  before  Him. 

1 A  man's  religious  life  must  keep  pace  with  the  growth  of 
his  knowledge  and  powers  of  reflection,  or  he  will  learn  to  think 
of  it  as  a  thing  divided  from  all  practical  interests,  as  a  mere 
reminiscence  of  his  childhood ;  he  will  gradually  drop  if  he  does 
not  deliberately  reject  it.  A  man's  prayers  must  prompt  and 
accompany  his  most  deliberate  actions ;  they  must,  if  it  may  be, 
keep  abreast  of  the  entire  range  of  his  mental  and  moral  eflbrt. 
New  subjects  will  constantly  crowd  for  recognition  ;  new  forms 
of  occupation,  new  friendships,  new  materials  for  thought  and 
speculation,  new  difficulties,  anxieties,  trials ;  new  hopes  and 
fears  ;  the  varying  fortunes  of  our  families  ;  the  course  of  public 
events ;  the  conduct  of  our  rulers  ;  the  failures  or  triumphs  of  the 
Church;  the  constant  departure — one  after  another — of  those 
whom  we  have  known  and  loved,  to  another  world,  and  the 
sense,  which  each  day  that  passes  must  deepen,  that  our  own 
turn  must  come  ere  long — all  this  is  material  for  prayer,  which 
is  constantly  accumulating.^ 

IF  A  prayer  must  have  thought  in  it.  The  thought  may  over- 
burden it  so  that  its  wings  of  devotion  are  fastened  down  to  its 
sides  and  it  cannot  ascend.  Then  it  is  no  prayer,  only  a  medita- 
tion or  a  contemplation.     But  to  take  the  thought  out  of  a  prayer 

^  H.  P.  Liddon,  Sermons  on  Some  Words  of  St.  Paul,  136. 


INTRODUCTION  15 

does  not  insure  its  going  up  to  God.  It  may  be  too  light  as 
well  as  too  heavy  to  ascend.  I  saw  once  in  a  shop-window  in 
London  a  placard  which  simply  announced  "  Limp  Prayers  ".  It 
described,  I  believe,  a  kind  of  Prayer  Book  in  a  certain  sort  of 
binding  which  was  for  sale  within ;  but  it  brought  to  mind  many 
a  prayer  to  which  one  had  listened,  in  which  he  could  not  join, 
out  of  which  had  been  left  the  whole  backbone  of  thought,  and 
to  which  he  could  attach  none  of  his  own  heart's  desires.^ 

(3)  Once  more,  to  pray  is  to  put  the  will  in  motion,  just  as 
decidedly  as  we  do  when  we  sit  down  to  read  hard,  or  when  we 
walk  up  a  steep  hill  against  time.  That  sovereign  power  in  the 
soul  which  we  name  the  will  does  not  merely,  in  prayer,  impel 
us  to  make  the  first  necessary  mental  effort,  but  it  also  enters 
most  penetratingly  and  vitally  into  the  very  action  of  the  prayer 
itself.  It  is  the  will  which  presses  the  petition ;  it  is  the  will 
which  struggles  with  the  reluctance  of  sloth  or  with  the  secret 
opposition  of  sinful  passion ;  it  is  the  will  which  perseveres ;  it  is 
the  will  which  exclaims:  "I  will  not  let  thee  go,  except  thou 
bless  me  ".  The  amount  of  will  which  we  severally  carry  into 
the  act  of  prayer  is  the  ratio  of  its  sincerity ;  and  where  prayer 
is  at  once  real  and  prolonged,  the  demands  which  it  makes  upon 
our  power  of  concentrating  determination  into  a  specific  and  con- 
tinuous act  are  very  considerable  indeed. 

IT  There  has  been  much  debate  among  the  learned  concerning 
the  psychology  of  religion;  and  scholars  have  compared  the 
reason,  the  emotions,  and  the  will  as  elements  in  religious  ex- 
perience. Do  we  in  religion,  first  of  all,  think,  or  feel,  or  act  ? 
Some  teachers  have  urged  that  the  essence  of  religion  must  be 
found  in  thought.  Right  thinking  is  the  foundation  of  a  saving 
faith.  The  truth  makes  one  free.  Who  is  the  Christian  ?  It  is 
he  who  has  been  taught  the  truth  about  God,  Christ,  the  Church, 
and  the  Christian  creed.  Other  teachers  have  regarded  the 
emotions  as  the  fundamental  element  in  religious  experience. 
Behind  all  doctrines  of  theology,  they  say,  lies  the  religious 
sentiment  itself,  and  this  feeling  of  dependence  supplants  all 
necessity  of  proof.  Who  is  the  Christian  ?  It  is  he  who  has 
been  thus  deeply  stirred  by  the  emotion  of  religion.  "The 
Spirit  searcheth  all  things,  yea,  the  deep  things  of  God."  Now, 
no  doubt,  there  is  much  to  say  in  behalf  of  both  rationaHsm  and 
mysticism.       A  definite  theology  and  a  profound  emotion  are 

^  Phillips  Brooks,  Lectures  on  Preaching^  243. 


i6      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

essential  parts  of  a  complete  religious  life.  Yet  when  we  turn 
to  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  we  observe  an  extraordinary  emphasis 
on  the  third  element  of  consciousness,  the  will.  ''  My  meat,"  He 
says,  "  is  to  do  the  will  of  him  that  sent  me."  "  Whosoever  shall 
do  the  will  of  God  .  .  .  the  same  is  my  brother,  and  my  sister ; " 
and  still  more  strongly  in  this  verse  from  the  Fourth  Gospel : 
"  If  any  man  willeth  to  do  his  will,  he  shall  know  of  the  teaching  ". 
However  important  it  may  be  to  have  a  creed  that  is  sound  or 
an  emotion  that  is  warm,  the  Christian  life,  according  to  the 
Gospels,  is  primarily  determined  by  the  direction  of  the  will,  the 
fixing  of  the  desire,  the  habit  of  obedience,  the  faculty  of  decision. 
When  a  modern  psychologist  says  that  ''The  willing-department 
of  life  dominates  both  the  thinking-department  and  the  feeling- 
department,"  he  is  in  fact  but  repeating  the  great  words :  "  If  any 
man  willeth  to  do  his  will,  he  shall  know  of  the  teaching  ".  Here 
is  the  aspect  of  the  religious  life  which  gives  courage  and  hope  to 
many  a  consciously  imperfect  experience.  You  are  not  sure  about 
your  creed  ?  That  is  a  pity.  You  do  not  respond  to  the  emotion 
of  the  revivalist  or  the  poet  ?  That  also  is  a  loss.  But,  after  all, 
the  fundamental  question  concerns  the  discipline  of  your  will. 
Are  you  determined  in  your  purpose  ?  Have  you  the  will  to  do 
the  will  ?  Then,  even  with  half  a  creed  and  less  than  half  a  pious 
ecstasy,  you  are  at  least  in  the  line  of  the  purpose  of  Jesus  Christ 
and,  as  you  will  to  do  the  will,  may  come  some  day  to  know  the 
teaching.  "  Obedience,"  said  Frederick  Robertson,  "  is  the  organ 
of  spiritual  knowledge."  First  the  discipline  of  the  will,  then 
the  truth  which  lies  beyond  that  ethical  decision.  Our  thoughts 
may  grow  breathless  as  they  climb ;  our  emotions  may  ebb  as 
they  flow ;  but  our  wills  may  march  steadily  up  the  heights  of 
life,  or  flow  steadily  through  the  experiences  of  life  as  a  river 
seeks  the  sea.  The  profoundest  modern  statement  of  Christian 
faith  is  the  confession  of  Tennyson : — 

Our  wills  are  ours,  we  know  not  how, 
Our  wills  are  ours,  to  make  them  Thine. ^ 

II  The  three  ingredients  of  prayer — emotion,  intellect,  will—are 
also  ingredients  in  all  real  work,  whether  of  the  brains  or  of  the 
hands.  The  sustained  eflbrt  of  the  intelligence  and  of  the  will 
must  be  seconded  in  work  no  less  than  in  prayer  by  a  movement 
of  the  affections,  if  work  is  to  be  really  successful.  A  man  must 
love  his  work  to  do  it  well.  The  difference  between  prayer  and 
ordinary  work  is  that  in  prayer  the  three  ingredients  are  more 
equally  balanced.     Study  may  in  time  become  intellectual  habit, 

^  F.  G.  Peabody,  Mornings  in  the  College  Chapel^  ii.  200. 


•  INTRODUCTION  17 

which  scarcely  demands  any  effort  of  will :  handiwork  may  in 
time  become  so  mechanical  as  to  require  little  or  no  guidance  from 
thought :  each  may  exist  in  a  considerable,  although  not  in  the 
highest,  degree  of  excellence,  without  any  co-operation  of  the 
affections.  Not  so  prayer.  It  is  always  the  joint  act  of  the  will 
and  the  understanding,  impelled  by  the  affections  ;  and  when 
either  will  or  intelligence  is  wanting,  prayer  at  once  ceases  to  be 
itself,  by  degenerating  into  a  barren  intellectual  exercise,  or  into 
a  mechanical  and  unspiritual  routine.^ 

1 H.  P.  Liddon. 


11. 

The  Nature  of  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Biederwolf,  W.  E.,  How  Can  God  Answer  Prayer  ?  (1913). 

Blewett,  G.  J.,  The  Christian  View  of  the  World  (1912). 

Bousset,  W.,  The  Faith  of  a  Modern  Protestant  (1909). 

Bowne,  B.  P.,  The  Essence  of  Religion  (1911). 

Brown,  W.  A.,  Christian  Theology  in  Outline  (1907). 

Chandler,  A.,  Faith  and  Experience  (1911). 

Cornaby,  W.  A.,  Prayer  and  the  Human  Problem  (1912). 

Dods,  M.,  How  to  Become  Like  Christ  (1897). 

Everett,  C.  C,  Theism  and  the  Christian  Faith  (1909). 

Fallows,  S.,  Health  and  Happiness  (1908). 

Gray,  H.  B.,  Modern  Laodiceans  (1883). 

Greenwell,  Dora,  Essays  (1867). 

Horton,  R.  F.,  The  Open  Secret  (1904). 

„      My  Belief  {190S>). 
How,  W.  W.,  Plain  Words,  iv.  (1901). 
Illingworth,  J.  R.,  Christian  Character  (1904). 
Ingram,  A.  F.  W.,  Banners  of  the  Christian  Faith  (1899). 

„  The  Call  of  the  Father  (1907). 

Jackson,  G.,  The  Teaching  of  Jesus  (1903). 
Jones,  R.  M.,  The  Double  Search  (1906). 
Julian  of  Norwich,  Revelations  of  the  Divine  Love  (1901). 
Kahler,  M.,  Berechtigung  und  Zuversichtlichkeit  des  Bittgebets  (1888). 
Kostlin,  J.,  Christliche  Ethik  (1899). 
Law,  W.,  The  Spirit  of  Prayer. 
Liddon,  H.  P.,  Some  Elements  of  Religion  (1873). 
Lodge,  O.,  The  Substance  of  Faith  (1907). 
Mackintosh,  H.  R. ,  Studies  m  Christian  Truth. 
Martineau,  J.,  Hours  of  Thought,  ii.  (1896). 
Moberly,  R.  C,  ChHst  Our  Life  (1902). 

Murray,  D.  A.,  Christian  Faith  and  the  New  Psychology  (1911). 
Patterson,  C.  B. ,  Dominion  and  Power  (1910). 
Robinson,  A.  W.,  in  Cambridge  Theological  Essays  (190b). 
Watson,  J.,  The  Inspiration  of  Our  Faith  (1905). 
Dictionary  of  the  Bible,  iv.  (1902)  38  (E.  R.  Bernard). 
Harvard  Theological  Review,  iv.  (1911)  491  (M.  W.  Calkins). 


20 


The  Nature  of  Prayer. 

Prayer  may  be  understood  widely,  so  as  to  include  every 
form  of  address  from  man  to  God,  whatever  its  character. 
Hannah's  song  is  a  thanksgiving,  yet  it  is  introduced  by  the 
words  "  Hannah  prayed  and  said  ".  The  prayer  of  Habakkuk  is 
a  psalm. 

In  the  larger  sense  of  the  word,  as  the  spiritual  language  of 
the  soul,  prayer  is  intercourse  with  God,  often  seeking  no  end 
beyond  the  pleasure  of  such  intercourse.  It  is  praise ;  it  is 
congratulation ;  it  is  adoration  of  the  Infinite  Majesty ;  it  is  a 
colloquy  in  which  the  soul  engages  with  the  All- wise  and  the  All- 
holy  ;  it  is  a  basking  in  the  sunshine,  varied  by  ejaculations  of 
thankfulness  to  the  Sun  of  Righteousness  for  His  light  and  His 
warmth.  In  this  larger  sense,  the  earlier  part  of  the  Te  Deum  is 
prayer  as  much  as  the  latter  part ;  the  earliest  and  latest  clauses 
of  the  Gloria  in  Excelsis  as  truly  as  the  central  ones  ;  the  Sanctus 
or  the  Jubilate  no  less  than  the  Litany ;  the  Magnificat  as  certainly 
as  the  Fifty-first  Psalm. 

1.  The  lowest  and  crudest  notion  concerning  prayer  is  that  it 
consists  in  asking  God  for  things,  and  its  value  consists  in  getting 
the  things  for  which  we  ask.  This  is  the  notion  with  which  child- 
hood always  begins,  and  the  only  one  which  childhood  can 
entertain.  This  notion  is  also  prominent  in  popular  re- 
ligious thought,  and  underlies  much  of  what  is  said  concerning 
answers  to  prayer.  This  view  is  very  superficial,  and  is  the 
parent  of  much  scepticism  respecting  prayer.  It  is  no  uncommon 
thing  to  find  young  persons  sceptical  with  respect  to  prayer 
because  they  have  failed  to  get  the  things  for  which  they  have 
prayed ;  and  often  the  faith  of  older  persons  breaks  down  from 
the  same  cause.  In  the  stress  of  some  trial  they  have  faithfully 
prayed,  and  no  answer  has  come.  Friends  or  relatives  have  died, 
or  their  own  health  has  failed,  or  their  way  has  been  hedged  up ; 

31 


22       CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

and  all  the  while  Heaven  has  seemed  as  deaf  to  their  cries  and  en- 
treaties as  the  ear  of  the  dead ;  and  they  have  been  left  to  sorrow 
and  uncertainty  and  bereavement  and  manifold  distress.  Such  cases 
abound ;  and,  if  we  would  escape  the  painful  doubts  arising  thence, 
we  must  revise  and  deepen  our  conception  of  prayer  and  its 
relation  to  the  religious  life.  Plainly,  the  view  of  prayer  simply 
as  a  talisman  or  as  a  means  of  getting  things  is  inadequate  to  ex- 
perience. 

IT  Prayer  is  not,  as  it  has  been  scornfully  described,  "  only  a 
machine  warranted  by  theologians  to  make  God  do  what  His 
clients  want "  :  it  is  a  great  deal  more  than  petition,  which  is  only 
one  department  of  it ;  it  is  nothing  less  than  the  whole  spiritual 
action  of  the  soul  turned  towards  God  as  its  true  and  adequate 
object.  And  if  used  in  this  comprehensive  sense,  it  is  clear  that, 
as  to  much  prayer,  in  the  sense  of  spiritual  intercourse  with  God, 
the  question  whether  it  is  answered  can  never  arise,  for  the 
simple  reason  that  no  answer  is  asked  for.^ 

IT  Prayer  may  take  on  any  form  of  personal  intercourse.  Un- 
questionably this  has  been  the  teaching  of  the  Church.  "  To  speak 
boldly,"  says  Clement  of  Alexandria,  ''prayer  is  conversation 
and  intercourse  with  God."  "  Prayer,"  says  St.  Thomas,  "  is  the 
ascent  of  the  soul  to  God."  Sabatier  repeats  almost  the  words 
of  Clement  when  he  describes  prayer  as  "  intercourse  with  God, 
.  .  .  intimate  commerce,  .  .  .  interior  dialogue ".  And  the  out- 
come of  that  most  penetrating  study  of  personal  religion,  William 
James's  The  Varieties  of  Religious  Experience,  is  a  similar 
definition  of  prayer  as  "  every  kind  of  inward  communion  or  con- 
versation with  the  power  recognized  as  divine  ".^ 

IT  Our  Christian  faith  is  that  God's  deepest  purpose  in  the 
creation  of  men  is  that  He  may  have  spiritual  children  made  in 
His  image  and  likeness,  who  shall  know  Him  and  love  Him,  and 
to  whom  He  may  communicate  Himself  in  blessing  for  ever  and 
ever.  And  our  earthly  life  is  arranged  by  Divine  wisdom  for 
our  discipline  and  development  as  the  children  of  God.  We 
must  be  practised  in  industry,  in  self-control,  in  integrity  and 
faithfulness,  in  helpfulness  and  mutual  trust,  in  the  love  and 
practice  of  righteousness,  and  in  faith  in  God.  In  such  a  life  we 
need  pre-eminently  to  recognize  our  dependence  on  God,  to  relate 
our  life  to  His  will,  to  seek  to  enter  into  fellowship  with  Him. 

^  H.  P.  Liddon,  Some  Elements  of  Religion,  183. 

'Mary  Whiton  Calkins,  in  The  Harvard  Theological  Review,  iv.  491. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  23 

This  religious  desire  and  effort  of  the  soul  to  relate  itself  and  all  its 
interests  to  God  and  His  will  is  prayer  in  the  deepest  sense. 
This  is  essential  prayer.  Uttered  or  unexpressed,  it  is  equally 
prayer.  It  is  the  soul's  desire  after  God  going  forth  in  manifesta- 
tion. It  may  find  expression  in  petition,  or  in  worship,  or  in 
obedience,  or  in  multitudinous  forms  of  activity ;  but  the  thing 
itself  is  always  the  same — the  soul's  striving  after  God.  This  is 
the  prayer  which  may  exist  without  ceasing,  consisting,  as  it 
does,  not  in  doing  or  saying  this  or  that,  but  in  the  temper  or  at- 
titude of  the  spirit.^ 

2.  But  what  of  the  prayer  of  petition?  The  answer  to  this 
question  must  be  that  there  is  a  psychological  necessity  for 
prayer  in  this  form.  The  circumstances  of  human  life  are  such 
that  we  are  perpetually  reminded  of  our  needs  and  dependence 
at  every  turn.  Goods  are  lacking ;  dangers  threaten  ;  perplexities 
surround  us.  The  future  is  hidden,  and  omens  of  ill  are  rarely 
absent.  This  is  true  for  the  purely  earthly  life,  and  truer  still 
for  the  hidden  life  of  the  spirit.  Hence,  wherever  there  is  an 
active  belief  in  God  at  all,  there  will  always  be  petition.  It  is 
the  great  form  in  which  the  sense  of  dependence  finds  expression 
in  both  private  and  public  devotion.  We  recall  our  needs,  or 
they  force  themselves  upon  us,  and  we  ask  God  for  help  and 
guidance  and  deliverance.  Some  religious  thinkers  of  a  quietistic 
type  have  condemned  specific  petition  altogether,  beyond  the 
prayer  that  the  will  of  God  may  be  done ;  but  this  has  been 
ecclesiastically  condemned  as  an  unreal  exaltation,  and  is  psycho- 
logically fictitious  and  practically  impossible  in  most  lives. 

I. 

Prayer  is  Desire. 

1.  Why  do  we  pray?  Because  it  is  a  vital  necessity  to  the 
life  of  man.  Prayer  is  desire ;  desire  enters  into  everything  in 
life,  so  that  life  is  an  unceasing  prayer.  Desire  relates  us  to- 
whatever  we  desire  whether  it  be  material  things,  mental  attain- 
ments, or  spiritual  understanding.  Desire  may  be  superficial  and 
transitory ;  and  from  such  desire  little  return  will  come.  A  life 
that  is  filled  with  such  desires  is  never  able  to  express  anything 
that  is  great  or  wonderful,  but  is  satisfied  with  trivial  results, 

^  B.  P.  Bowne,  The  Essence  of  Religion,  131. 


24      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

showing  that  one  cannot  express  anything  that  is  greater  or 
higher  than  the  ideals  that  exist  in  the  mind.  When  you  see 
great  things  accomplished  by  any  one,  know  that  it  is  in  answer 
to  prayer ;  that  only  the  great  desire  can  bring  the  great  result. 
This  applies  not  only  to  some  things,  but  to  everything  in  life. 
Our  lives,  whatever  they  may  be,  are  the  true  expression  of  our 
prayers.  We  should  know  that  our  false  as  well  as  our  true 
desires  are  alike  expressed,  each  desire  as  a  seed  carrying  within 
itself  its  own  fruition,  each  bringing  its  own  punishment  or 
reward.  If  we  could  all  realize  the  truth  of  this,  what  a  differ- 
ence it  would  make  in  our  prayers.  If  we  knew  that  a  true 
desire  always  related  us  to  the  good  and  the  true,  ever  becoming 
the  seed  for  greater  and  more  perfect  expression,  or  if  we  realized 
that  our  false  desires  not  only  brought  about  the  loss  of  mental 
and  physical  energy,  but  also  brought  into  our  lives  unpleasant 
and  disagreeable  things,  we  would  try  to  shape  our  desires  in 
order  to  have  them  conform  to  the  true  requirements  of  the  law 
of  desire  and  its  fulfilment. 

It  is  said,  "  They  that  desire  nothing  pray  for  nothing,"  and 
it  is  certainly  a  poor  sort  of  prayer  which  has  in  it  no  earnest 
wish  for  its  own  success.  A  beggar  who  showed  by  his  manner 
that  he  did  not  care  to  have  his  petition  granted  would  be  little 
likely  to  gain  it.  This  desire  for  that  which  we  pray  for  is  not 
to  be  won  in  a  moment,  or  excited  in  the  soul  at  will.  It  is  a 
part  of  a  much  wider  thing — a  part  of  the  very  life  of  God  in  the 
soul.  When  the  heart  is  given  to  God,  and  the  affections  are 
set  on  things  above,  then  this  desire  will  come  simply  and 
naturally,  and  our  prayers  will  be  not  only  carefully  uttered 
requests  but  holy  longings  and  heartfelt  desires. 

IF  So  homely  a  thing  as  the  desire  of  animals  for  food  and  the 
effort  to  satisfy  it  is  a  form  of  prayer.  The  cry  of  the  child  for 
attention  from  its  mother  is  a  prayer.  Our  hunger  and  thirst, 
our  dependence  on  food  and  drink  for  life  itself,  keep  us,  while 
we  are  on  this  lower  plane,  in  a  constant  state  of  prayer.  In  the 
world  of  inorganic  nature,  as  well  as  in  the  world  of  animal  nature 
and  of  human  nature  on  its  physical  side,  God  has  made  ample 
provision  for  answers  to  prayer.  With  the  want  come  the  means 
of  satisfaction.  We  know  that  the  universe  is  the  result  of 
absolutely  orderly  law  and  arrangement.  To  have  provided  only 
for  the  lower  needs  of  man,  disregarding  his  mental  and  spiritual 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  25 

needs,  would  have  been,  to  say  the  least,  illogical.  But  God  is 
not  illogical.  The  appeals  coming  from  a  higher  plane  are  heard 
and  answered.  "  Prayer,  based  on  want,"  Dr.  Matheson  says, 
"  is  the  premonitory  symptom  of  a  larger  life."  The  greater  the 
want,  the  higher  the  development.  In  this  sense  the  glorious 
advance  of  history  is  an  answer  to  prayer.  The  formulating  of 
the  laws  of  evolution,  the  development  of  electricity,  the  discovery 
of  radium  and  of  other  modern  wonders  which  mark  the  nine- 
teenth and  twentieth  centuries,  the  great  progress  in  intellectual 
and  material  affairs — all  this  is  an  answer  to  prayer,  to  the  prayer 
of  man  marching  to  a  higher  development,  asking  consciously  or 
unconsciously  the  knowledge  to  carry  him  farther.^ 

2.  Prayer  is  the  expression  of  a  good  desire.  The  human 
heart  is  full  of  restless  desires,  and  the  prayers  of  men  consist  for 
the  most  part  of  the  unsifted  petitions  which  are  urged  by  their 
varying  passions.  But  nothing  can  be  plainer  than  this,  that 
prayers  can  never  be  answered  unless  the  desires  that  prompt 
them  are  right.  And  doubtless  the  main  reason  why  prayers 
remain  unanswered  is  that  the  desires  have  not  been  corrected  by 
meditation.     When  Wordsworth  says — 

Me  this  unchartered  freedom  tires  ; 
I  feel  the  weight  of  chance-desires  : 

and  appeals  to  duty  to  regulate  and  restrain  desire,  he  reminds 
us  of  what  we  all  know — that  vain  and  contradictory  desires 
constitute  the  burden  of  life ;  and  that  to  desire  what  is  right, 
and  to  desire  it  consistently  and  passionately,  is  the  first  condition 
of  true  living.  The  desires  can  be  corrected  only  by  truth.  The 
mind  must  apprehend  God,  and  then  it  will  say,  "  There  is  none 
upon  earth  that  I  desire  beside  thee  "  ;  it  must  grasp  the  thought 
of  the  will  of  God,  and  then  it  will  passionately  desire  that  its 
will  may  be  in  absolute  harmony  with  His. 

Prayer  means  the  discipline  of  desire.  Embalmed  in  the  106th 
Psalm  is  the  record  of  one  of  those  weirdly  tragic  stories  of  the 
wilderness  journey  of  the  Israelites — the  story  of  Kibroth 
Hattaavah  or  Graves  of  Desire.     The  comment  is  familiar  : — 

He  gave  them  their  request ; 
But  sent  leanness  into  their  soul. 

How   far   spiritual  loss   is  meant  to  be  set  side   by  side  with 

^  S.  Fallows,  Health  and  Hapjjiness,  4. 


26      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

material  gain  does  not  affect  the  fact  that  life  through  and  through 
is  tried  by  that  contrast,  and  the  comment  on  the  old-world  story 
expresses  that  fact  with  striking  accuracy.  The  cases  of  Lot, 
Esau,  Balaam,  Ahab,  Gehazi,  Judas,  and  Demas  illustrate  the 
same  strange  possibility  of  inward  treachery  of  desire.  It  is  the 
fate  of  all  who  have  been 

Cursed  with  the  burden  of  a  granted  prayer. 

(1)  That  God  sometimes  suffers  men  to  destroy  themselves, 
giving  them  their  own  way,  although  He  knows  it  is  ruinous,  and 
even  putting  into  their  hand^  the  scorpion  they  have  mistaken 
for  a  fish,  is  an  indubitable  and  alarming  fact.  Perhaps  no  form 
of  ruin  covers  a  man  with  such  shame  or  sinks  him  to  such  hope- 
lessness as  when  he  finds  that  what  he  has  persistently  clamoured 
for  and  refused  to  be  content  without  has  proved  the  bitterest 
and  most  disastrous  element  in  his  life. 

IF  It  is  a  thing  partly  worth  our  wonder,  partly  our  compassion, 
that  what  the  greatest  part  of  men  most  passionately  desire,  that 
they  are  generally  most  unfit  for;  so  that  at  a  distance  they 
court  that  as  an  enjoyment,  which  upon  experience  they  find  a 
plague  and  a  great  calamity.^ 

(2)  How  does  God  deal  with  it  ?  For  a  long  time  He  may  in 
compassion  withhold  the  fatal  gift.  He  may  in  pity  disregard 
our  petulant  clamour.  And  He  may  in  many  ways  bring  home 
to  our  minds  that  the  thing  we  crave  is  in  several  respects  un- 
suitable. We  may  become  conscious  under  His  discipline  that 
without  it  we  are  less  entangled  with  the  world  and  with  tempta- 
tion ;  that  we  can  live  more  holily  and  more  freely  as  we  are, 
and  that  to  quench  the  desire  we  have  would  be  to  choose  the 
better  part.  God  may  make  it  plain  to  us  that  it  is  childish  to 
look  upon  this  one  thing  as  the  supreme  and  only  good.  Provi- 
dential obstacles  are  thrown  in  our  way,  difficulties  amounting 
almost  to  impossibilities  absolutely  prevent  us  for  a  while  from 
attaining  our  object,  and  give  us  time  to  collect  ourselves  and 
take  thought.  And  not  only  are  we  prevented  from  attaining 
this  one  object,  but  in  other  respects  our  life  is  enriched  and 
gladdened,  so  that  we  might  be  expected  to  be  content. 

(3)  But  man's  will  is  never  forced  ;  and  therefore  if  we  con- 

» Robert  Sonth. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  27 

tinue  to  pin  our  happiness  to  this  one  object,  and  refuse  to  find 
satisfaction  and  fruit  in  life  without  it,  God  "gives  in  anger" 
what  we  have  resolved  to  obtain.  He  gives  it  in  its  bare  earthly 
form,  so  that  as  soon  as  we  receive  it  our  soul  sinks  in  our 
shame.  Instead  of  expanding  our  nature  and  bringing  us  into  a 
finished  and  satisfactory  condition,  and  setting  our  life  in  right 
relations  with  other  men,  we  find  the  new  gift  to  be  a  curse  to  us, 
hampering  us,  cutting  us  off"  in  unexpected  ways  from  our  useful- 
ness, thwarting  and  blighting  our  life  round  its  whole  circumference. 

^  When  Samuel  remonstrated  with  Israel  and  warned  them 
that  their  king  would  tyrannize  over  them,  all  the  answer  he  got 
was  :  "  Nay ;  but  we  will  have  a  king  to  rule  over  us  ".  But,  not 
many  days  after,  they  came  to  Samuel  with  a  very  different  peti- 
tion :  "  Pray  for  thy  servants  unto  the  Lord  thy  God,  that  we  die 
not :  for  we  have  added  unto  all  our  sins  this  evil,  to  ask  us  a 
king".  So  it  is  always  ;  we  speedily  recognize  the  difference  be- 
tween God's  wisdom  and  our  own.  What  seemed  neglect  on  His 
part  is  now  seen  to  be  care,  and  what  we  murmured  at  as  niggard- 
liness and  needless  harshness  we  now  admire  as  tenderness. 
Those  at  least  are  our  second  and  wiser  thoughts,  even  although 
at  first  we  may  be  tempted  with  Manoah,  when  he  saw  his  son 
blind  and  fettered  in  the  Philistine  dungeon,  to  exclaim  : — 

What  thing  good 
Pray'd  for,  but  often  proves  our  woe,  our  bane  ? 
I  pray'd  for  children,  and  thought  barrenness 
In  wedlock  a  reproach  ;  I  gain  d  a  son 
And  such  a  son  as  all  men  hail'd  me  happy ; 
Who  would  be  now  a  father  in  my  stead? 
Oh,  wherefore  did  God  grant  me  my  request, 
And  as  a  blessing  with  such  pomp  adorn'd  ? 
Why  are  His  gifts  desirable,  to  tempt 
Our  earnest  prayers,  then  giv'n  with  solemn  hand 
As  graces,  draw  a  scorpion's  tail  behind  ? 

Such,  I  say,  may  be  our  first  thoughts  ;  but  when  the  first  bitter- 
ness and  bewilderment  of  disappointment  are  over,  when  reason 
and  right  feeling  begin  to  dominate,  we  own  that  the  whole  his- 
tory of  our  prayer  and  its  answer  has  been  most  humiliating  to 
us,  indeed,  but  most  honouring  to  God.  We  see  as  never  before 
how  accurately  our  character  has  been  understood,  how  patiently 
our  evil  propensities  have  been  resisted,  how  truly  our  life  has 
been  guided  towards  the  highest  ends.^ 

^  Marcus  Dods,  How  to  Become  Like  Christ,  76. 


28      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  You  remember  the  story  of  the  Argive  mother,  who,  carried 
to  Juno's  feet  by  her  two  sons  when  the  horses  failed,  prayed  to 
the  Queen  of  Heaven  that  for  their  tilial  piety  her  darlings  might 
receive  the  richest  guerdon  that  Heaven  could  bestow ;  and  how, 
in  answer  to  her  prayer,  when  the  night  fell  on  her  sleeping  sons, 
death  fell  on  them  too,  lifting  them  far  from  evil  fate  and  making 
them  glad  with  great  gladness,  and  the  hapless  mother  saw  that 
the  goddess  had  been  too  bountiful.  It  is  a  fable,  pregnant  with 
a  lesson  for  us  ;  we  cannot  tell  how  often  our  petitions,  if  granted, 
might,  like  swords  of  wrath,  sweep  away  sweeter  mercies  from 
our  path,  leaving  us  shorn,  defenceless,  and  alone.^ 

3.  We  must  go  further.  Prayer  is  the  expression  of  a  good 
desire ;  it  is  also  the  expression  of  a  God  ward  desire.  As  Isaac 
Pennington  says  :  "  By  Prayer,  I  do  not  mean  any  bodily  exercise 
of  the  outward  man;  but  the  going  forth  of  the  Spirit  of  life 
towards  the  Fountain  of  life,  for  fulness  and  satisfaction :  the 
natural  tendency  of  the  poor,  rent,  derived  spirit,  towards  the 
Fountain  of  spirits  ". 

IF  The  natural  and  common  heritage  of  love  and  faith  is  a 
theme  that  is  dear  to  Julian ;  in  her  view,  longing  toward  God 
is  grounded  in  the  love  to  Him  that  is  native  to  the  human 
heart,  and  this  longing  (painful  through  sin)  as  it  is  stirred  by 
the  Holy  Spirit  who  comes  with  Christ,  is,  in  each  naturally  de- 
veloped Christian,  spontaneous  and  increasing;  *'for  the  nearer 
we  be  to  our  bliss,  the  more  we  long  after  it  ".2 

IF  You  don't  suppose  that  the  insight  with  which  a  poet's 
mind  is  endowed  is  just  his  ordinary  reasoning  powers  ?  It  is 
something  different — it  is  contact  with  a  spirit  greater  than  his 
own.  If  the  aspiration  is  theirs,  amounting  to  nothing  more  than 
a  sensation,  it  is  sufficient  to  produce  that  aim  at  assimilation 
that  is  called  prayer.  It  is  the  same  sort  of  thing  that  makes  a 
plant  force  its  way  through  a  crevice  to  get  the  sun's  rays.^ 

My  inmost  soul,  0  Lord,  to  Thee 

Leans  like  a  growing  flower 
Unto  the  light.     I  do  not  know 

The  day  nor  blessed  hour 
When  that  deep-rooted,  daring  growth 

We  call  the  heart's  desire 

1  Herbert  Branston  Gray,  Modern  Laodiceans,  83. 

*  Grace  Warrack,  in  Introduction  to  Julian  of  Norwich's  Revelations  of  the  Divifie 
Love,  xxxiv. 

^  George  Frederick  Watts,  ii.  174. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  29 

Shall  burst  and  blossom  to  a  prayer 

Within  the  sacred  fire 
Of  Thy  great  patience;  grow  so  pure, 

So  still,  so  sweet  a  thing 
As  perfect  prayer  must  surely  be. 

And  yet  my  heart  will  sing 
Because  Thou  seem'st  sometimes  so  near, 

Close-present  God  !  to  me. 
It  seems  I  could  not  have  a  wish 

That  was  not  shared  by  Thee  ; 
It  seems  I  cannot  be  afraid 

To  speak  my  longings  out, 
So  tenderly  Thy  gathering  love 

Enfolds  me  round  about ; 
It  seems  as  if  my  heart  would  break, 

If,  living  on  the  light, 
I  should  not  lift  to  Thee  at  last 

A  bud  of  flawless  white. 
And  yet,  O  helpless  heart!  how  sweet 

To  grow,  and  bud,  and  say : 
The  flower,  however  marred  or  wan. 

Shall  not  be  cast  away.^ 

4.  This  Godward  desire  is  a  reflex  of  the  Divine  desire  itself. 
The  faith  which  steals  in  at  prayer-time  is  the  tacit  assurance — 
though  we  may  not  put  it  in  so  many  words — that  our  prayer  is 
the  real  expression  of  Divine  desire  working  within  us.  And 
what  greater  encouragement  than  this  can  visit  the  soul  of  man  ? 
That  prayer  is  the  reflex  in  man  of  the  Divine  desire  itself  is  ex- 
pressly assumed  in  the  words  of  Jesus  :  *'  What  things  soever  ye 
desire,  when  ye  pray,  believe  that  ye  receive  them,  and  ye  shall 
have  them  "  (Mark  xi.  24,  A.V.).  For  here,  surely,  is  meant  not 
merely  human  desire — whether  of  the  heathen  burglar  who  prays 
for  riches  obtained  illicitly,  or  of  the  law-abiding  poor  man  who 
prays  for  riches  in  the  course  of  honourable  trading,  or  of  suppliants 
all  and  sundry  who  pray  for  any  boon  which  may  make  their 
lives  dignified,  comfortable  and  shadow-free ;  else  were  human 
desire,  when  directed  towards  the  highest  deity  known,  the 
ultimate  ruling-force  in  the  universe — an  anomaly  which  the 
Lord  Jesus  never  meant  to  suggest.  Rather  must  we  believe 
that  He  had  in  mind  desires  that  are  begotten  of  God,  and  that 

1  Elizabeth  Stuart  Phelps. 


30      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

kind  of  "  believing  "  also  which  is  given  of  God — a  sign-manual 
that  the  desire  within  corresponds  to  the  Desire  enthroned  above. 
Given  this  state,  then  faith  is  the  hand  stretched  out  to  grasp 
the  proffered  gift.  And  it  has  been  verily  so,  with  large  result, 
as  generations  of  godly  souls  have  abundantly  testified. 

IT  Oh  plain,  and  easy,  and  simple  way  of  salvation !  wanting 
no  subtleties  of  art  or  science,  no  borrowed  learning,  no  refine- 
ments of  reason,  but  all  done  by  the  simple  natural  motion  of 
every  heart  that  truly  longs  after  God.  For  no  sooner  is  the 
finite  desire  of  the  creature  in  motion  towards  God,  but  the 
infinite  desire  of  God  is  united  with  it,  co-operates  with  it.  And 
in  this  united  desire  of  God,  and  the  creature,  is  the  salvation 
and  life  of  the  soul  brought  forth. ^ 

IF  Enthusiasm  born  of  numbers  may  simulate  the  true  faith 
that  is  normally  born  in  the  secret  chamber,  in  one  soul  or  more 
secluded  with  God  But  even  then  it  becomes  a  great  impulse 
towards  daring  venture  for  what  is  esteemed  the  cause  of  God. 
The  Council  of  Clermont  met  in  the  year  1095  to  consider  the 
project  of  a  great  crusade  against  the  Turks,  and  broke  up  amid 
unanimous  shouts  of  Deus  id  vult,  which  became  the  battle- 
cry  of  that  First  Crusade.  In  surer  manner,  if  in  humbler 
fashion,  a  godly  labouring  man  of  a  certain  English  town  was 
wont  to  relate  his  answers  to  prayer,  adding  the  words  :  "  I  said 
to  myself,  this  ere  is  God's  will,  and  my  will,  so  I  just  claim  it  ". 
He  had  learned  the  logic  of  faith,  based  on  the  essentials  of  all 
true  prayer — the  coincidence  of  Divine  and  human  desire.'^ 

IL 

Prayer  is  Communion. 

True  prayer  is  something  more  than  desire.  It  is  no  mere 
subjective  instinct — no  blind  outreach.  If  it  met  no  response, 
no  answer,  it  would  soon  be  weeded  out  of  the  race.  It 
would  shrivel  like  the  functionless  organ.  We  could  not  long 
continue  to  pray  in  faith  if  we  lost  the  assurance  that  there  is  a 
Person  who  cares,  and  who  actually  corresponds  with  us.  Prayer 
has  stood  the  test  of  experience.  In  fact  the  very  desire  to  pray 
is  in  itself  prophetic  of  a  Heavenly  Friend.  A  subjective  need 
always  carries  an  implication  of  an  objective  stimulus  which  has 

1 W.  Law,  The  Spirit  of  Prayer,  87. 

2  W.  A.  Cornaby,  Prayer  and  tJie  Human  Problem,  178. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  31 

provoked  the  need.  There  is  no  hunger,  as  Fiske  has  well  shown, 
for  anything  not  tasted ;  there  is  no  search  for  anything  which  is 
not  in  the  environment,  for  the  environment  has  always  produced 
the  appetite.  So  this  native  need  of  the  soul  rose  out  of  the 
Divine  origin  of  the  soul,  and  it  has  steadily  verified  itself  as  a 
safe  guide  to  reality. 

Prayer  is  thus  the  psychological  act  by  which  the  soul  seeks 
and  finds  contact,  conscious  contact,  or  communion,  with  God. 
In  the  first  instance  it  is  not  asking  for  anything,  it  is  not  peti- 
tion ;  all  it  seeks  is  God  Himself.  When  it  makes  a  request, 
there  is  always  a  preface :  Let  me  find  Thee,  let  me  know  Thee, 
then  I  will  ask  of  Thee.  Francis  of  Assisi,  we  are  told,  would 
frequently  spend  an  hour  or  two  in  prayer  on  Monte  Alverno, 
and  the  only  word  he  would  say  would  be  "  God,"  repeated  at 
intervals.     That  is  prayer,  bare,  elemental,  essential  prayer. 

Look  at  Jesus,  remaining  through  the  long  hours,  in  tran- 
quillity of  spirit,  with  God.  Is  not  the  central  reality  of  His 
prayer,  and  therefore  of  prayer  in  its  perfect  meaning,  in  this : 
this  which  includes  and  transcends  alike  the  petition  of  need,  and 
the  stress  of  battle ;  this  inner  communing,  thought  to  thought, 
with  God ;  this  reflection  of  spirit  in  Spirit ;  this  perfecting  of 
character  in  reciprocal  intercourse ;  this  shaping,  in  mutual  con- 
verse, of  mind,  meaning,  and  will ;  this  response  of  love  to  love  ; 
this  unveiledness  of  face  ;  this  reflecting,  as  a  mirror,  of  the  being 
of  God ;  this  transfiguration,  wherein  man,  as  man,  becomes  him- 
self a  very  image  of  God,  growing  progressively  from  glory  to 
glory,  which  is  indeed  the  proper  fruit  of  the  Spirit — the  Spirit 
which  is  the  Lord  ? 

IF  To  pray  for  everything  just  means  to  have  fellowship  with 
the  Father  in  everything.^ 

IF  I  understand  that  when  our  spirits  are  attuned  to  the 
Spirit  of  Righteousness,  our  hopes  and  aspirations  exert  an  in- 
fluence far  beyond  their  conscious  range,  and  in  a  true  sense 
bring  us  into  communion  with  our  Heavenly  Father.  This  power 
of  filial  communion  is  called  prayer ;  it  is  an  attitude  of  mingled 
worship  and  supplication  :  we  offer  petitions  in  a  spirit  of  trust 
and  submission,  and  endeavour  to  realize  the  Divine  attributes, 
with  the  help  and  example  of  Christ.^ 

1  M.  Kahler,  Berechtigung  und  Zuversichtlichkeit  des  Bittgebets. 

2  0.  Lodge,  Th6  Substance  of  Faith,  116. 


32      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IT  When  I  stir  thee  to  prayer,  I  stir  thee  not  to  the  prayer 
which  standeth  in  many  words,  but  to  that  prayer  which  in  the 
secret  chamber  of  the  mind,  in  the  privy  closet  of  the  soul  with 
very  affect  speaketh  to  God,  and  in  the  most  lightsome  darkness 
of  contemplation  not  only  presenteth  the  mind  to  the  Father : 
but  also  uniteth  it  with  Him  by  unspeakable  ways  which  only 
they  know  that  have  assayed.  Nor  I  care  not  how  long  or  how 
short  thy  prayer  be,  but  how  effectual,  how  ardent,  and  rather 
interrupted  and  broken  between  with  sighs  than  drawn  on  length 
with  a  continual  row  and  number  of  words.^ 

1.  There  is  perhaps  in  this  communion  at  first  only  a  vague 
feeling  after  companionship,  which  remains  in  many  persons 
vague  to  the  end.  But  in  others  it  frequently  rises  to  a  definite 
consciousness  of  a  personal  Presence,  and  there  comes  back  into 
the  soul  a  compelling  evidence  of  a  real  Other  Self  who  meets  all 
the  soul's  need.  For  such  persons  prayer  is  the  way  to  fulness 
of  life.  It  is  as  natural  as  breathing.  It  is  as  normal  an  opera- 
tion as  appreciation  of  beauty  or  the  pursuit  of  truth.  The  soul 
is  made  that  way,  and  as  long  as  men  are  made  with  mystical 
deeps  within,  unsatisfied  with  the  finite  and  incomplete,  they  will 
pray  and  be  refreshed. 

Vague  and  formless,  in  some  degree,  communion  would  al- 
ways be  apart  from  the  personal  manifestation  of  God  in  Jesus 
Christ.  As  soon  as  God  is  known  as  Father,  as  soon  as  we  turn 
to  Him  as  identical  in  being  with  our  own  humanity,  as  suffering 
with  us  and  loving  us  even  in  our  imperfection,  this  communion 
grows  defined  and  becomes  actual  social  fellowship,  which  is 
prayer  at  its  best.  St.  Paul's  great  prayers  of  fellowship  rise  to 
the  God  and  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  the  God  whom  we 
know,  because  He  has  been  humanly  revealed  in  a  way  that  fits 
our  life.  We  turn  to  Him  as  the  completeness  and  reality  of  all 
we  want  to  be,  the  other  Self  whom  we  have  always  sought. 
The  vague  impulse  to  reach  beyond  our  isolated  and  solitary  self 
gives  place  to  an  actual  experience  of  relationship  with  a  personal 
Friend  and  Companion,  and  this  experience  may  become,  and 
often  does  become,  the  loftiest  and  most  joyous  activity  of  life. 

IT  Prayer  is  the  ethical  and  religious  act  in  which  the  fellow- 
ship of  the  believing  man  and  Christian  with  his  God  finds  its 

^  Giovanni  Pico  della  Mirandola. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  33 

strongest  and  most  specific  expression,  and  by  which  this  fellow- 
ship is  most  profoundly  realized  and  furthered.^ 

IF  This  fact  of  communion  with  the  Father  breaks  clean 
through  that  mechanical  view  of  the  world  which  turns  it  into 
a  dead  world  ;  for  it  means  that  God  is  doing  the  wonderful  new 
free  thing  of  conversing  with  His  human  child,  and  is  being 
answered  by  His  child's  faith.  Such  prayer,  such  genuine  fellow- 
ship with  God,  is  something  which  laughs  at  fate  and  its  rigidities, 
and  to  see  it  so  is  to  breathe  a  higher,  freer  air,  in  which  the 
universe  takes  on  the  better  aspect  of  a  real  training-ground  for 
Divine  sonship.  It  is  a  universe  in  which  God  is  free  to  speak 
with  man. 2 

2.  Communion  implies  sympathy,  and  if  sympathy  is  present 
it  makes  little  difference  what  is  actually  said  or  thought.  You 
may  meet  a  man  and  say  to  him  merely  that  the  day  is  fine,  but 
if  you  have  said  it  with  sympathy  you  have  had  communion 
with  him.  On  the  other  hand,  you  may  have  talked  long  with 
him  and  on  high  topics,  but  if  it  has  been  without  sympathy 
there  has  been  no  communion.  The  sympathy  need  not  find 
utterance  at  all.  Animals  do  not  talk,  and  yet  they  like  to  be 
together ;  and  it  is  pleasant  to  sit  by  one's  friend,  though  he  and 
you  may  speak  no  word  to  each  other  for  many  minutes.  Now 
if  we  raise  all  this  to  the  highest  point,  it  may  help  to  show  what 
communion  is  like  between  man  and  God,  and  it  will  be  seen 
that,  given  the  communion,  the  sympathy,  the  form  or  subject 
of  one's  prayer  will  matter  little  ;  the  soul  may  be  trusted  to 
pour  itself  out  in  its  sense  of  sympathy  and  submission.  The 
poor  serving-woman  who  can  understand  hardly  a  word  of  the 
Latin  service  has  the  sense  of  the  Divine  Presence  and  lays  open 
before  it  her  life  with  all  its  needs. 

IF  We  may  find  a  very  homely  but  pertinent  parallel  illustra- 
tion in  men's  treatment  of  animals,  and  though  the  illustration 
may  seem  belittling  yet  we  must  remember  that  the  difference 
in  rank  between  animals  and  men  is  infinitely  less  than  between 
men  and  God.  About  the  only  way  men  know  to  tame  and 
domesticate  animals,  that  is  to  say,  to  bring  them  into  a  measure 
of  fellowship  with  themselves,  is  precisely  this  same  method  of 
making  some  good  gift  to  the  animal  contingent  on  its  asking  for 

^  J.  Kostlin,  Christliche  Ethik,  247. 

2  H.  E.  Mackintosh,  Studies  in  Christia7i  Truth,  28. 

3 


34      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

it,  or  coming  into  some  contact  with  the  man.  When  the  farmer 
takes  a  vessel  of  corn  or  salt  or  other  delicacy  to  the  pasture 
with  him  to  induce  his  farm  animals  to  come  fearlessly  to  him,  it 
may  be  true  that  the  shy  ones  that  don't  come  fail  to  get  some- 
thing that  would  have  been  good  for  them,  and  it  is  certainly 
true  that  those  that  come  get  something  by  their  coming  which 
they  would  not  have  got  if  they  had  not  come ;  but  still  there 
was  no  violation  there  of  the  orderly  laws  of  that  farm's  manage- 
ment. There  is  no  putting  of  the  will  of  a  silly  animal  above 
the  will  and  wisdom  of  the  wise  owner.  It  is  not  a  makeshift  to 
patch  up  a  defect  in  the  efficiency  of  the  system  of  farm  feeding. 
Nor  is  it  necessarily  a  plan  to  enable  certain  favoured  animals  to 
live  better  than  others  and  better  than  they  could  by  the  unaided 
working  of  the  ordinary  farm  management.  The  one  object  is 
fellowship,  or  in  common  language  to  make  those  animals  tame, 
friendly,  and  not  afraid  of  him.  Precisely  such  is  the  nature  of 
the  institution  which  we  call  prayer.  Its  object  is  to  domesticate 
men  to  God's  household,  to  induce  them  to  voluntarily  come  to 
God  without  fear  and  engage  in  fellowship  with  Him.^ 

3.  Communion  with  God  also  implies  submission  to  His  will. 
It  is  in  communion  that  man  most  truly  realizes  himself  by  making 
himself  most  truly  an  organ  in  the  self -fulfilment  of  God.  So  to 
ask  whether  prayer  is  effective  is  like  asking  whether  it  is  effective 
to  be  alive  unto  God,  effective  to  realize  one's  true  being  and  to 
fulfil  one's  Divine  vocatioa  In  fact  it  is  only  when  we  fall  un- 
consciously into  the  mistake  of  regarding  prayer  as  something 
external  to  the  communion  of  the  Christian  man  with  God — or 
into  the  still  more  radical  mistake  of  regarding  that  communion 
itself  as  something  external  to  the  essential  life  of  humanity  and 
of  nature — that  we  raise  this  question  of  the  effectiveness  of  prayer 
at  all.  It  is  like  asking  whether  it  is  effective  for  reality  to  be 
real,  or  for  life  to  live.  The  essential  will  of  the  Christian  man 
is  that  in  all  the  ways  of  the  world  God  may  fulfil  Himself  ;  in 
pursuance  of  that  will,  the  Christian  man  gives  his  loyalty  to 
those  causes  of  human  welfare  in  which  the  heart  of  man  gradually 
has  been  learning  to  articulate  and  make  definite  its  longing  for 
God  and  for  good.  When  such  a  man  brings  before  God  all 
things  of  his  life — all  the  things  his  heart  fears,  all  the  things  his 
heart  desires — the  doubt  is  not  whether  such  prayer  is  effective  ; 
the  doubt  is  whether  there  is  in  the  world  any  other  permanently 
'  D.  A.  Murray,  Christian  Faith  and  the  New  Psychology^  292, 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  35 

effective  force  than  such  prayer  and  the  life  that  is  lived  in  the 
spirit  of  such  prayer. 

IT  Regarding  prayer  not  so  much  as  consisting  of  particular 
acts  of  devotion,  but  as  the  spirit  of  life,  it  seems  to  be  the  spirit 
of  harmony  with  the  will  of  God.  It  is  the  aspiration  after  all 
good,  the  wish,  stronger  than  any  earthly  passion  or  desire,  to 
live  in  His  service  only.  It  is  the  temper  of  mind  which  says  in 
the  evening,  "  Lord,  into  thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit  "  ;  which 
rises  up  in  the  morning  "To  do  thy  will,  O  God  "  ;  and  which 
all  the  day  regards  the  actions  of  business  and  of  daily  life  unto 
the  Lord  and  not  to  men — **  Whether  ye  eat,  or  drink,  or  what- 
soever ye  do,  do  all  to  the  glory  of  God  ".  The  trivial  employ- 
ments, the  meanest  or  lowest  occupations,  may  receive  a  kind  of 
dignity  when  thus  converted  into  the  service  of  God.  Other  men 
live  for  the  most  part  in  dependence  on  the  opinion  of  their 
fellow-men ;  they  are  the  creatures  of  their  own  interests,  they 
hardly  see  anything  clearly  in  the  mists  of  their  own  self-decep- 
tions. But  he  whose  mind  is  resting  in  God  rises  above  the  petty 
aims  and  interests  of  men ;  he  desires  only  to  fulfil  the  Divine 
will,  he  wishes  only  to  know  the  truth.  His  "  eye  is  single,"  in 
the  language  of  Scripture,  and  his  whole  body  is  full  of  light. 
The  light  of  truth  and  disinterestedness  flows  into  his  soul ;  the 
presence  of  God,  like  the  sun  in  the  heavens,  warms  his  heart. 
Such  a  one,  whom  I  have  imperfectly  described,  may  be  no 
mystic ;  he  may  be  one  among  us  whom  we  know  not,  undis- 
tinguished by  any  outward  mark  from  his  fellow-men,  yet 
carrying  within  him  a  hidden  source  of  truth  and  strength  and 
peace.  1 

4.  We  enter  into  communion  with  God  at  His  own  invitation. 
Prayer  is  our  conscious  response,  as  free  beings,  to  God's  invita- 
tion, the  effort  on  our  part  to  enter  into  that  intercourse  with 
God  which  He  on  His  part  desires  us  to  have.  It  is  therefore 
miserably  misconceived  by  its  critical  opponents,  when  repre- 
sented as  a  mere  petition  for  favours.  For  it  is  something 
infinitely  wider  and  more  important  than  this.  It  is  the  affirma- 
tion of  our  social  nature,  seeking  its  only  adequate  end  in  union 
with  the  absolute  and  permanent  source  of  all  society.  Hence 
prayer  is  as  many-sided  as  life,  and  as  all-embracing  as  faith,  for 
it  is  faith  in  action.  And  its  human  analogue  is  not  petition,  but 
intercourse  with  a  friend.     Primarily,  we  desire  such  intercourse 

^  Benjamin  Jowett. 


\ 


36      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

as  an  end  in  itself,  simply  because  our  friend  is  our  friend,  and 
the  fact  of  converse  with  him  manifests  and  satisfies  our  friend- 
ship. And  then  we  tell  him  our  thoughts  and  seek  his  criticism 
and  approval  of  them  ;  we  discuss  our  plans  with  him  and  ask 
his  advice  ;  we  express  our  affection,  our  admiration,  our  gratitude 
towards  him  for  his  friendship  ;  we  invite  him  to  share  our  joys, 
and  seek  his  sympathy  with  our  sorrows. 

And  God  responds.  For  prayer  is  nothing  at  all  except  as 
on  the  one  side  there  is  a  human  ''I,"  on  the  other  a  Divine 
"  Thou,"  and  living  fellowship  between  the  two.  This  is  a 
matter  on  which  there  can  be  no  dispute.  What  could  speech 
mean  if  there  were  no  one  to  listen  and  to  reply  ?  But  more, 
the  man  who  prays  is  conscious,  be  it  dimly  or  clearly,  that  his 
prayer  has  been  drawn  from  him  by  Another's  influence.  Some 
creative  hand  touched  him,  stirring  the  sense  of  need,  claiming 
his  trust ;  then  he  began  to  pray,  sure  amid  all  other  uncertain- 
ties that  it  is  best  for  children  to  speak  out  their  requirements 
to  the  father,  notwithstanding  that  the  father  may  know  already 
what  their  requirements  are.  Real  fellowship  with  the  living 
God — not  make-believe  about  it,  or  keeping  up  a  familiar  but 
useless  habit — this  is  prayer. 

IT  What  is  prayer  ?  It  is,  when  we  comprehend  it  in  its 
deepest  and  most  peculiar  significance,  a  dialogue  between  our 
innermost  self  and  Almighty  God,  a  real  and  true  experience.  It 
is  an  uplifting  of  the  human  soul  to  the  highest  reality,  God  con- 
descending and  bending  towards  the  individual  human  soul.  It 
is  a  mystery  of  whose  deepest  and  innermost  truth  and  splendour 
we  are,  perhaps,  fully  conscious  only  at  rare  moments  in  our  lives. ^ 

IF  There  is  a  direct  and  mutual  communion  of  spirit  with 
spirit  between  ourselves  and  God,  in  which  He  receives  our  affec- 
tion and  gives  a  responsive  breathing  of  His  inspiration.  Such 
communion  appears  to  me  as  certain  a  reality  as  the  daily  inter- 
course between  man  and  man  ;  resting  upon  evidence  as  positive, 
and  declaring  itself  by  results  as  marked.  The  disposition  to 
throw  doubt  on  the  testimony  of  those  who  affirm  that  they 
know  this  is  a  groundless  prejudice,  an  illusion  on  the  negative 
side  as  complete  as  the  most  positive  dreams  of  enthusiasm.  At 
least,  unless  something  better  can  be  urged  against  the  doctrine 
of  prayer  than   the  commonplaces  about  the  fixity  of   natural 

1  W.  Bouaset,  The  Faith  0/  a  Modern  Protestant,  60. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  37 

laws,  I  must  profess  I  know  of  nothing  in  the  constitution  of  this 
universe  at  all  at  variance  with  our  natural  faith  in  a  personal 
intercourse  with  God,  in  His  openness  to  our  appeal  and  our 
susceptibility  to  His  spirit.^ 

5.  Taking  prayer  as  inter-communion  between  God  and  our- 
selves, we  can  understand  how  by  it  our  knowledge  of  God  can 
be  enormously  deepened  and  extended.  We  get  to  know  our 
friends  better  by  conversation  and  familiar  intercourse.  And  so 
we  shall  get  to  know  God  better  by  conversing  with  Him.  But 
we  are  very  apt  to  forget  that  if  conversation  is  to  do  this  work 
it  must  not  be  one-sided,  and  our  ordinary  conversation  with  God 
is  terribly  one-sided.  We  insist  on  doing  all  the  talking  our- 
selves; we  go  straight  through  our  prayers,  almost  without 
drawing  breath,  and  then  get  up  and  go  away,  without  leaving  a 
moment  to  God  in  which  He  may  talk  to  us.  It  is  no  wonder 
that  such  prayers  do  not  much  advance  our  knowledge  of  Him  to 
whom  we  speak,  and  to  whom  we  refuse  to  listen.  We  must  make 
pauses  in  our  prayers,  during  which  we  wait  for  God's  answer 
to  come,  whether  it  be  in  the  form  of  reproof  or  comfort  or  in- 
struction; whether  it  come  as  illumination  to  the  mind  or  strength 
and  courage  to  the  heart.  If  we  would  only  converse  humbly 
and  modestly  with  God,  instead  of  merely  giving  Him  detailed 
information  of  things  which  He  knows  already,  prayer  would  be  a 
far  more  effective  agent  in  Divine  knowledge  than  we  find  it  to 
be  at  present.  In  particular,  our  knowledge  of  God  would  become 
more  personal.  We  should  go  away  with  a  knowledge  of  Him  in 
His  personal  nature,  as  revealed  in  what  He  speaks  to  our  soul, 
and  with  an  experience  of  His  power  and  readiness  to  satisfy  our 
personal  needs  and  aspirations. 

IT  The  last  and  highest  result  of  prayer  is  not  the  securing  of 
this  or  that  gift,  the  avoiding  of  this  or  that  danger.  The  last 
and  highest  result  of  prayer  is  the  knowledge  of  God — the  know- 
ledge which  is  eternal  life;  and  by  that  knowledge  the  trans- 
formation of  human  character  and  of  the  world.^ 

1  J.  Martineau,  Hours  of  Thought,  ii.  224. 

2  G.  J.  Blewett,  TJie  Christian  View  of  the  World,  249. 


38      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

m. 

Prayer  is  Petition. 

1.  Although  prayer  has  been  defined  as  communion  with  God, 
as  aspiration  after  the  highest  things,  Stopford  Brooke  is  right 
when  he  insists  that  prayer  in  its  plainest  meaning  is  a  petition 
addressed  to  God.  Take  the  element  of  petition  out  of  prayer, 
and  prayer  may  be  a  wholesome  exercise  of  the  soul  or  a  spiritual 
energy  of  the  life,  but  it  ceases  to  be  what  we  mean  by  prayer. 
Prayer  with  Jesus  was  straightforward  and  unhesitating  petition, 
asking  God  to  do  something,  and  believing  that  He  would  do  it. 
And  when  Jesus  laid  the  duty  of  petition  upon  His  disciples.  He 
went  on  to  assert  the  reasonableness  of  a  man  asking  and  of  God 
answering,  by  that  argument  from  man  to  God  which  he  loved 
to  use  and  which  is  thoroughly  scientific.  If  a  child  in  an  earthly 
home  were  hungry  he  would  turn  by  an  instinct  to  his  parents, 
and  if  he  asked  bread  would  the  father  give  the  child  a  stone  ? 
Impossible,  because  it  would  be  contrary  to  nature ;  and  if  you 
could  imagine  a  state  of  aflfairs  where  the  oflfspring,  whether  birds 
in  a  nest  or  infants  in  a  home,  received  stones  instead  of  food  from 
their  parents,  you  would  have  a  topsy-turvy  world.  Jesus  there- 
fore argues  along  the  line  of  reason,  that  if  an  earthly  parent, 
although  from  his  limitations  often  foolish  and  sometimes  evil, 
yet  does  the  best  in  his  power  for  his  children,  will  not  the 
Almighty  and  All-wise  Love,  of  which  human  love  is  only  the 
shadow,  do  better  still  for  His  great  family  ?  And  therefore 
our  Master  teaches  that  men  ought  everywhere  to  pray  without 
fear  and  without  doubt. 

Again,  if  we  build  our  argument  for  the  effectiveness  of 
prayer  upon  the  common  consent  of  mankind,  we  must  be  pre- 
pared to  accept  the  common  consent  of  mankind  as  to  what  has 
been  intended  by  prayer.  Now,  beyond  question,  what  has  been 
intended  has  been  petition.  The  cry  that  has  gone  up  from  in- 
numerable souls  through  all  the  ages,  pagan  and  Christian,  has 
been  a  cry  for  some  kind  of  good,  or  for  deliverance  from  some 
kind  of  evil,  addressed  to  a  higher  Power  which,  it  was  hoped, 
could  be  moved  to  give  the  good,  or  to  ward  off  the  evil.  It  is 
prayer  in  this  sense  to  which  the  deep  instinct  and  long  habit  of 
the  soul  have  borne  witness. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  39 

Thus,  although  petition  is  not  the  whole  of  prayer,  it  is  a 
legitimate  and  necessary  part  of  it.  This  results  from  the  fact 
that  both  in  the  individual  and  in  society  the  Christian  life  is 
still  incomplete.  We  are  conscious  that  we  ourselves  are  not  yet 
what  in  God's  plan  we  ought  to  be,  and  no  genuine  speaking  to 
God  can  ignore  the  fact.  So  with  praise  and  thanksgiving  go 
inevitably  the  petitions  for  forgiveness  of  sins  and  deliverance 
from  temptation.  Again,  when  we  seek  to  follow  Christ  in 
labour  for  His  Eangdom,  we  are  aware  of  a  thousand  obstacles 
which  thwart,  and  often  seem  utterly  to  defeat,  our  efforts.  So 
prayer  that  is  natural  and  sincere  must  ever  include  as  one  of 
its  elements  the  petition  that  these  obstacles  may  be  removed 
and  God's  Kingdom  may  come. 

IF  A  devoted  Christian  rejoices  in  his  privilege  of  offering 
petitions  to  God  and,  in  spite  of  objections  to  petitionary  prayer, 
makes  thankful  use  of  this  privilege.  In  trustful  surrender  of 
himself  to  God  he  knows  that  all  the  needs,  tasks,  and  straits, 
under  which  he  must  assert  and  prove  himself  as  an  ethical  per- 
sonality and  Christian  come  from  God,  and  in  his  humility,  he  is 
well  aware  that,  in  order  thus  to  prove  himself,  he  needs  God's 
help  every  moment.  He  cherishes  this  consciousness  with  regard 
to  his  natural  life  and  its  maintenance,  and  more  especially  with 
regard  to  the  needs  and  tasks  of  his  inner  man,  that  guilt  which 
still  oppresses  him  and  that  moral  weakness  which  still  cleaves 
to  him.  Many  who  depreciate  petitionary  prayer,  simply  trust- 
ing in  God,  as  they  say,  really  do  so  because  they  are  confident  in 
the  enjoyment  of  a  more  fortunate  eternal  life  which  God  has 
granted  them,  and  in  the  consciousness  of  their  own  moral 
strength,  which  is  due  to  the  lack  of  earnest  self-examination. 
It  is  an  inner  impulse  that  leads  the  Christian  to  petition,  and  he 
follows  this  impulse  in  thankful  trust  in  the  answer  promised 
him.  He  does  not,  however,  let  his  petitions  be  determined  by 
merely  selfish  interests  and  inclinations,  but  seeks  to  obtain  that 
which  will  further  his  true  weal.  Indeed,  it  is  God's  highest 
ethical  aims  which  his  praying,  like  his  working  and  endeavour- 
ing, must  directly  or  indirectly  serve.  He  is  God's  fellow- 
worker.^ 

IF  I  have  been  much  struck  of  late  in  reading  several  books  on 
this  subject,  to  note  how  one  writer  after  another  judges  it  need- 
ful to  warn  his  readers  against  the  idea  that  prayer  is  no  more  than 

1  J.  Kostlin,  Christliche  Ethik,  254. 


40      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

petition.  What  they  say  is,  of  course,  true  ;  prayer  is  much  more 
than  petition.  But,  unless  I  misread  the  signs  of  the  times,  this 
is  not  the  warning  which  just  now  we  most  need  to  hear.  Rather 
do  we  need  to  be  told  that  prayer  is  more  than  communion,  that 
petition,  simple  asking  that  we  may  obtain,  is  a  part,  and  a  very 
large  part,  of  prayer.  "  Who  rises  from  prayer  a  better  man," 
says  George  Meredith,  *'  his  prayer  is  answered."  This  is  true, 
but  it  is  far  from  being  the  whole  truth.  ^ 

^  Mahometanism  is  a  creed  without  sacrifice,  without  mystery, 
and  (so  far  as  I  am  informed  on  this  point)  without  prayer ;  its 
deep-rooted  fatalism  leaves  no  room  for  the  pleading  human  voice 
of  supplication ;  its  only  language  is  that  of  acquiescence  in  that 
"  inexorable  will  which  it  calls  God  ".  Deism  also  adores  and  ac- 
quiesces, it  does  not  pray.  "  I  accustom  my  mind,"  says  Rous- 
seau, "  to  sublime  contemplations.  I  meditate  upon  the  order  of 
the  universe,  not  for  the  sake  of  reducing  it  to  vain  systems,  but 
to  admire  it  unceasingly,  to  adore  the  wise  Creator  who  makes 
Himself  felt  within  it.  I  converse  with  the  Author  of  the  uni- 
verse; I  imbue  all  my  faculties  with  His  Divine  essence.  My 
heart  melts  over  His  benefits.  I  bless  Him  for  all  His  gifts,  but 
I  do  not  pray  to  Him.     What  have  I  to  ask  Him  for  ? "  ^ 

2.  Not  only  are  the  subjective  effects  of  prayer  very  much 
heightened  when  due  place  is  given  in  prayer  to  petition,  but 
with  petition  eliminated  there  would  be  less  communion 
with  God  than  there  is.  Not  that  one  goes  to  God  only  when 
one  has  a  petition  to  ofier  (for  there  is  much  communion  without 
petition),  but  if  a  man  had  any  sort  of  assurance  that  such  ap- 
proach of  the  soul  to  God  as  communion  involves  was  being  made 
to  a  Supreme  Being  whose  ear  was  deaf  and  whose  heart  was  in- 
different to  our  cries  of  distress  and  our  petitions  for  help,  or,  hear- 
ing, could  not  help  us,  because  of  the  inevitable  course  of  things 
over  which  He  has  no  control,  the  probability  is  that  that  man 
would  soon  begin  to  incline  towards  a  state  of  dumb  resignation 
to  the  inevitable,  which  in  turn  would  rapidly  tend  towards  the 
neglect  of  prayer  altogether.  We  pray  too  little  as  it  is.  If  with 
Frederick  W.  Robertson  we  see  in  prayer  only  such  contemplation 
of  the  character  of  God  as  ends  with  the  resignation  of  ourselves 
to  His  will,  most  men,  we  fear,  would  not  put  themselves  even 
to  such  effort  to  obtain  it.     They  would  be  more  likely  to  accept 

G.  Jackaon,  The  Teaching  of  Jems,  154.  ^  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays,  120. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  41 

the  inevitable  and  devote  the  time  otherwise  required  for  such 
contemplation  to  making  the  best  out  of  a  condition  of  affairs  for 
which  there  is  no  help,  at  least  from  above.  But,  on  the  contrary, 
to  know  that  God  hears  our  cry  for  help  as  well  as  our  voice  in 
praise  and  thanksgiving  and  confession,  and  that  like  as  a  father 
He  not  only  pitieth  His  children  but,  having  the  power,  He  gives 
them  what  would  not  be  theirs  but  for  the  asking,  then  are  we 
constrained  to  come  to  Him,  not  alone  with  our  petitions  but  with 
the  expression  of  grateful  hearts  ;  then  are  we  drawn  into  His 
presence  by  that  very  fact,  not  only  in  the  hour  of  special  need 
but  continually,  even  as  with  the  closest  friend. 

3.  It  is  for  experience  to  decide  whether  prayer  is  of  practical 
use,  and  it  is  always  better  to  depend  upon  expert  witnesses — to 
hear  Darwin  rather  than  a  gardener  on  the  variation  of  plants  ; 
Lord  Kelvin  rather  than  a  telegraphist  on  the  properties  of  elec- 
tricity ;  and  the  saints  rather  than  amateur  critics  of  religion  on 
prayer.  One  turns  to  Abraham,  who  interceded  for  Sodom,  to 
Jacob,  who  wrestled  with  the  angel  until  the  day  broke,  to  Moses, 
who  in  the  darkness  of  Sinai  obtained  God's  mercy  for  his  nation, 
to  Elijah,  who  opened  and  sealed  the  heavens  by  prayer,  and  to 
the  unknown  poets  who  gave  us  the  matchless  liturgy  of  the 
Psalms.  One  appeals  in  later  days  to  St.  Paul,  whose  letters 
break  off  at  great  moments  into  petition,  to  St.  John,  who  in  the 
vision  of  prayer  beheld  the  Heavenly  Jerusalem,  and  to  our  Lord 
Himself,  who  spent  whole  nights  in  prayer  upon  the  lonely  moun- 
tain side.  One  remembers  in  modern  times  the  multitude  of  be- 
lieving men  who  have  wrought  marvels  by  prayer;  how  the 
more  Martin  Luther  had  to  do,  the  more  he  prayed ;  how  Crom- 
well on  his  death-bed  interceded  for  God's  cause  and  God's  people 
in  the  finest  prayer  ever  offered  by  a  patriot ;  how  it  was  written 
of  "the  Saints  of  the  Covenant"  in  Scotland  that  they  lived 
"  praying  and  preaching,"  and  that  they  died  "praying  and  fight- 
ing ".  Time  would  fail  to  tell  how  the  saints  of  the  Church  and 
the  champions  of  God's  cause  have  prayed ;  but  we  should  re- 
member what  was  said  by  Lord  Salisbury  of  Mr.  Gladstone,  that 
he  was  "  a  great  Christian  statesman  " ;  and  that  brilliant  states- 
man drew  his  strength  from  the  springs  of  prayer.  What 
possessed  those  men  that  they  undertook  no  work  till  they  had 


42      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

first  met  with  God,  that  they  turned  unto  Him  in  every  hour  of 
defeat,  that  they  carried  to  His  feet  the  trophies  of  their  victories  ? 
Was  all  this  pure  waste  of  time  and  sheer  delusion  of  soul,  and 
were  they — the  men  who  have  known  most  about  religion — 
simply  deceived  when  they  testified  of  religion's  chief  act  ?  Is 
this  credible  ? 

IF  When  Queen  Victoria  was  opening  the  Town  Hall  of  Shef- 
field she  had  put  into  her  hand  a  little  golden  key,  and  she  was 
told  as  she  sat  in  her  carriage  that  she  only  had  to  turn  the 
golden  key  and  in  a  moment  the  Town  Hall  gates  of  SheflSeld 
would  fly  open.  In  obedience  to  the  authority  of  experts  who 
gave  her  the  directions,  she  turned  the  golden  key,  and  in  a  moment, 
by  the  action  of  electric  wires,  the  Town  Hall  gates  of  Sheffield 
flew  open.  Exactly  in  the  same  way  Jesus  Christ  must  know  one 
thing,  if  He  knows  anything,  and  that  is,  what  opens  heaven's  gates. 
He  must  know  that ;  He  must  know  what  key  it  is  which  opens 
heaven's  gates ;  and  in  His  teaching  He  reiterated  over  and  over 
again,  as  if  He  thought  that  this  was  one  of  the  things  we  should 
find  it  hardest  to  believe,  "  Ask,  and  it  shall  be  given  you  ;  seek, 
and  ye  shall  find ;  knock,  and  it  shall  be  opened  unto  you  ".  And 
I  say  that  if  we  are  justified  in  believing  in  the  Divinity  of  Christ, 
then  we  are  justified  in  going  a  step  further,  and  saying  that  His 
authority  is  good  enough  to  make  us  believe  that  the  golden  key 
of  prayer,  if  we  use  it,  will  open  the  gates  of  heaven.^ 

4.  But  we  can  go  further.  As  we  look  back  over  the  history 
of  the  world,  we  cannot  help  being  struck  by  the  fact  that  the 
men  of  prayer  are  the  men  of  power.  There  is  a  connexion  in 
history  between  prayer  and  power.  Take,  for  instance,  the  great 
reformer  of  the  past  century,  who  was  able  to  break  down  the 
most  determined  opposition  to  his  reforms,  and  to  free  the  little 
children  of  England  from  terrible  slavery — Lord  Shaftesbury. 
What  was  the  secret  of  his  supernatural  power  ?  If  we  read  his 
life  we  shall  see.  That  man  was  praying  continually.  He  was 
praying  in  the  House  of  Commons  before  he  made  his  speeches  ; 
he  was  praying  in  everything  he  did.  It  would  not  be  intelligent 
reading  of  biography  to  disconnect  his  prayer  from  his  power. 
Or  take  General  Gordon,  who  left  us  the  record  of  a  stainless 
soldier  who  could  stand  alone.  What  gave  him  the  strength  to 
do  it  ?     Here,  again,  we  cannot  intelligently  disconnect  his  extra- 

^  Biihop  Winnington  Ingram,  Banners  of  the  Christian  Faith,  67. 


THE  NATURE  OF  PRAYER  43 

ordinary  power,  his  extraordinary  personal  influence,  from  the 
white  handkerchief  outside  his  tent,  so  regularly  placed  there  two 
or  three  times  a  day,  which  meant  that  General  Gordon  was  at 
his  prayers.     Continuous  prayer  brings  personal  power. 

IF  It  is  a  wonderful  historical  fact  that  the  men  of  prayer  have 
always  been  the  men  of  power  in  the  world.  I  want  to  con- 
vince you  about  this.  Some  of  you  men — and  I  am  glad  to  see 
such  a  large  number  of  men  here  to-night — if  you  are  arguing 
with  some  friend  in  the  workshop,  be  sure  and  ask  him  why  it  is 
that  the  men  of  prayer  in  the  world  have  been  the  men  of  power. 
Take  only  one  instance.  Where  did  they  always  go  to  find  men 
for  the  forlorn  hope  in  Havelock's  days  ?  They  went  to  Have- 
lock's  prayer  meeting ;  that  is  where  they  found  men  who  had 
the  courage  to  come  out  for  the  forlorn  hope.^ 

^  Bishop  Winnington  Ingram,  The  Call  of  the  Father ^  75. 


III. 

Address  and  Adoration. 


Literature. 

Butler,  H.  M.,  Belief  in  Christ  (1898). 

Cook,  J.,  Monday  Lectures,  i.  (1878). 

Dickinson,  R.  D.,  in  The  American  Pulpit  of  the  Day,  ii.  (1876). 

Everett,  C.  C,  Theism  and  the  Christian  Faith  (1909). 

How,  W.  W.,  Plain  Words,  iv.  (1901). 

Ingram,  A.  F.  W.,  The  Love  of  the  Trinity  (1908). 

Jenkins,  E.  E.,  Life  and  Christ  (1896). 

Jones,  T.,  The  Divine  Order  (1884). 

Jowett,  J.  H.,  The  Silver  Lining  (1907). 

Law,  W.,  A  Serious  Call  to  a  Devout  and  Holy  Life. 

Lewis,  E,  W.,  Some  Views  of  Modern  Theology  (1905). 

Liddon,  H.  P.,  The  Divinity  of  Our  Lord  (1890). 

Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

Maclaren,  A.,  The  God  of  the  Amen  (1891). 

Matheson,  G.,  Rests  by  the  River  (1906). 

Moule,  H.  C.  G.,  Christ's  Witness  to  the  Life  to  Come  (1908). 

Tailing,  M.  P.,  Extempore  Prayer  (1902). 

Vaughan,  C.  J.,  Lectures  on  the  Revelation  of  St.  John  (1882). 

Williamson,  A.  W.,  Ideals  of  Ministry  (1901). 

Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 

Expository  Times,  xvii.  (1906). 


46 


Address  and  Adoration. 

Worship,  whether  private  or  public,  should  aim  at  completeness. 
It  should  embrace  the  several  great  leading  acts  of  devotion. 
There  should  be  Adoration,  Confession,  Petition,  Intercession,  and 
Thanksgiving. 

1.  The  question  is  sometimes  raised  whether  Adoration  or 
Confession  should  come  first.  Public  prayer  in  the  Church  of 
England  begins  with  Confession.  And  this,  says  Bishop  Walsham 
How,  seems  right  and  natural.  "  A  child  who  has  offended  its 
father  would  naturally  go  and  ask  forgiveness  before  seeking 
new  favours.  The  Reformers,  acting  upon  this  view,  and  going 
back  to  the  very  earliest  accounts  we  have  of  Christian  worship, 
added  the  penitential  portion  (that  is,  all  preceding  the  Lord's 
Prayer)  at  the  beginning  of  the  Daily  Morning  and  Evening 
Prayer ;  and  for  this  we  owe  them  a  deep  debt  of  gratitude.  It 
seems  well  that  our  private  prayer  should  follow  the  same  order, 
and  begin  with  Confession.  This  is  especially  needful  at  night, 
when  we  pass  in  review  the  day  which  is  over,  with  all  its  sins 
and  infirmities.  Surely  we  should  never  be  content  to  lie  down 
at  night  without  a  humble  and  penitent  confession  of  the  sins  of 
the  day  past.  Let  this  be  the  first  act  of  our  evening  devotion, 
and  all  the  rest  will  be  far  more  blessed.  We  shall  feel  we  are 
speaking  to  a  Father  from  whom  we  have  sought  and  won  pardon 
and  acceptance."  ^ 

But  in  order  that  Adoration  may  not  be  lost  sight  of,  since 
the  mind  is  so  apt  to  pass  directly  from  Confession  to  Petition,  it 
is  usually  recommended  that,  at  least  in  private  and  family  prayer, 
Adoration  should  come  first.  The  essential  element  in  our  ap- 
proach to  God  must  be  confession  of  sin  and  prayer  for  pardon. 
No  reasonable  worship  can  proceed  otherwise.     But  it  is  natural, 

1 W.  W.  How,  Plaifi  Words,  iv.  15. 
47 


48      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

and  indeed  inevitable,  that  it  should  be  prefaced  by  a  solemn 
invocation  of  Almighty  God,  whose  pardoning  grace  is  to  be 
sought  through  Jesus  Christ,  and  that  the  prayer  for  pardon  and 
peace  should  be  accompanied  by  some  comforting  and  strengthen- 
ing word  of  promise,  whereby  the  souls  of  the  worshippers  may 
be  assured  that  the  pardon  sincerely  sought  is  as  truly  and  really 
given. 

IF  "Adoration,"  it  has  been  truly  said,  "must  be  the  basis  of 
true  thanksgiving  and  praise  and  prayer;  it  is  the  fitting 
acknowledgment  of  our  real  relations  with  God  which  should 
precede  them."  But  if  it  is  real  it  will  not  only  precede,  it  will 
accompany  and  pervade,  them.  So  when  we  pass  from  invocation 
to  confession,  in  which  the  glance  of  the  soul  is  towards  God  but 
also  towards  self,  there  will  still  be  present  this  sense  of  the 
greatness  of  God,  this  sense  of  the  emptiness  and  insignificance 
of  self  which  impels  us  to  prostrate  ourselves  in  spirit  before 
Him.  The  same  will  hold  true  when  from  confession  we  pass  to 
the  prayer  for  pardon  and  peace,  to  a  renewal  of  our  dedication, 
and  to  supplications  for  God's  grace.  Like  a  thread  of  gold  this 
spiritual  chain  will  unite  them  all,  so  that  from  first  to  last  these 
varying  efforts  of  the  soul  will  be  one — a  solemn  act  of  adoration, 
a  humble  yet  daring  venture  to  pass  into  the  very  presence  of 
God,  and  to  claim,  as  our  right  in  Christ  and  through  Him,  com- 
munion with  the  Father.^ 

2.  Prayer,  in  the  narrow  sense  of  petition,  divides  itself  into 
petition  for  self  and  petition  for  others,  the  latter  being  generally 
known  as  Intercession.  Plainly  a  large  part  of  our  worship  must 
consist  of  these.  The  first  and  simplest  idea  of  worship  is  asking 
God  for  what  we  need.  Therefore  it  is  unnecessary  to  dwell 
further  upon  this.  It  is  probable  that  all  who  pray  at  all  do 
make  request  both  for  themselves  and  for  others. 

Thanksgiving  is  very  frequently  mingled  with  Adoration, 
yet  they  are  distinct  acts,  and  should  be  kept  distinct,  or  at  least 
should  be  distinctly  borne  in  mind,  so  that,  even  if  intermingled, 
neither  should  be  omitted.  Thanksgiving  differs  from  Adoration 
in  that,  while  the  latter  contemplates  God's  glory  and  God's 
goodness  in  themselves,  the  former  regards  these  as  displayed  in 
His  mercies  to  us.  Adoration  is  the  homage  of  the  creature  to 
the  Creator;   thanksgiving  of  the  benefited  to  the  Benefactor. 

1  A.  W.  Williamson,  Ideals  of  Ministry,  88. 


ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION 


49 


Let  there  be,  then,  in  our  devotions  a  distinct  act  of  grateful 
recollection  of  mercies  received,  both  ordinary  and  special. 

3.  It  is  well  worth  observing  how  these  different  parts  of 
prayer  are  comprehended  in  the  precept,  "  Pray  without  ceasing," 
and  thus  are  to  be  found  in  the  ordinary  experience  of  a  true 
Christian  life. 

(1)  What  is  every  consciousness  of  the  presence  of  Jesus 
Christ  to  the  believing  soul  but  Adoration  ?  The  seasons  of  such 
consciousness  are  very  contrasted.  To  one  man  it  is  the  manifes- 
tation of  a  Saviour  with  open  hands  in  the  mercy  and  blessing  of 
the  life  that  now  is  :  prosperity  is  about  him,  and  the  cares  and 
temptations  of  riches  beset  him.  To  another  it  is  in  the  darkness 
of  a  dispensation  that  has  been  brought  by  adversity,  bereave- 
ment, losses,  afflictions  of  every  sort,  which  can  be  resolved  only 
at  the  hands  of  a  Saviour  concealed  by  a  cloud.  But  in  whatever 
form  He  appears,  Christian  faith  perceives  the  Christ  who  reveals 
Himself.  All  absence  of  adoration  in  this  world,  whether  it 
takes  the  form  of  material  infidelity,  or  cold  deism,  or  critical 
rationalism,  is  only  blindness  towards  a  real  Christ.  It  is  not 
possible  that  He  should  be  driven,  exorcised  from  the  world  He 
has  formed,  and  the  people  He  has  redeemed.  Men  who  will 
close  their  eyes  to  Him,  and  who  will  not  seek  Him,  have 
no  adoration  to  present,  because  there  is  no  recognition  of  Him 
in  their  experience.  He  in  whom  it  hath  pleased  the  Father 
that  all  fulness  should  dwell — He,  the  first  and  the  last,  the  same 
yesterday,  to-day,  and  for  ever — stands  recognized  by  His  people, 
though  scoffed  at  by  opposers,  discriminating  men  in  their 
different  relations  to  Himself,  and  determining  their  destiny  and 
responsibility  by  this  solitary  test.  He  that  perceives  Christ 
every  day  is  continually  engaged  in  adoration. 

(2)  The  second  part  of  a  true  prayer  is  Confession.  What  is 
every  sense  of  sin  in  the  soul  of  a  trusting  disciple  but  this  penitent 
acknowledgment  before  God  our  Saviour  ?  Never  does  there 
come  to  us  a  conviction  of  guilt  but  it  is  associated  with  the 
promise  of  pardon  and  deliverance.  True  Christian  repentance 
does  not  lead  to  despair,  but  instantly  rings  the  chimes  of  hope 
in  the  soul.  We  look  out  from  our  consciousness  of  guilt  to 
a  God  and  Saviour  who  abundantly  pardons  and  restrains.     The 

4 


50      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

very  condition  of  Christian  faith  is  this  acknowledgment  of  sin 
in  the  presence  of  Him  who  has  become  a  complete  Redeemer. 
Though  not  a  word  of  confession  be  spoken,  though  not  a  syllable 
be  framed,  he  who  lives  burdened  by  his  own  unworthiness,  and 
yet  eager  in  spirit  to  name  his  Redeemer,  is  continually  con- 
fessing his  sin.  It  may  be  in  the  worldly  duties  of  living,  it 
may  be  in  the  seasons  of  worship,  it  may  be  as  he  listens  to  the 
Word ;  but  that  spirit  which  is  in  close  communion  with  its 
Redeemer  turns  even  involuntarily,  by  a  new  power  given  to  it 
in  regeneration,  towards  this  Saviour,  with  a  confession  of  its 
undesert. 

(3)  The  third  part  of  a  true  prayer  is  Petition  or  Supplication ; 
and  it  follows  immediately  that  every  sense  of  personal  infirmity, 
every  pressure  of  want,  is  instantly  referred  by  the  believer  to 
a  Lord  who  cares  for  him,  and  who  has  commanded  him  to  cast 
his  care  upon  a  care-taking  God.  The  Psalmist  expresses  it  under 
these  different  illustrations :  "  My  soul  gaspeth  as  a  thirsty  land  ; 
my  soul  panteth  after  God  as  the  wearied  and  heated  stag  for  the 
water-courses  ".  The  very  expression  of  the  experience  of  need 
becomes  a  petition  for  supply.  No  sooner  do  I  acknowledge  that 
I  want  anything  than  it  is  recognized  in  heaven  as  a  supplication 
for  that  which  supplies  that  need.  "  Blessed  are  they  that  hunger 
and  thirst."  To  know  that  to  need  grace  is  to  pray  for  grace. 
To  know  that  you  are  helpless  without  the  Divine  succour  ex- 
tended to  you  is  itself  the  lifting  up  of  holy  hands  for  the 
extending  of  such  Divine  relief.  A  sense  of  want  is  a  yearning 
and  prayer,  because  accompanied  by  faith  in  the  abundance  of 
Christ's  promise.  St.  Paul  carries  out  this  thought  in  the  catalogue 
of  contradictions,  when  in  substance  he  says,  I  am  weak,  but  yet 
I  am  strong ;  in  myself  I  have  nothing,  yet  I  have  all  things  in 
the  Christ  who  undertakes  for  me. 

(4)  But  again,  every  exercise  of  sympathy  and  love  is  Inter- 
cession. We  are  unselfish  just  in  the  measure  of  our  human  love. 
We  reach  out  towards  those  who  have  been  given  us  in  the  pro- 
vidence of  God,  and  then  beyond  the  home,  as  love  becomes  less 
selfish,  to  those  who  are  in  want  and  friendless,  and  then  beyond 
still  to  those  that  are  outcast  and  rejected,  until,  in  the  true  ex- 
perience of  Christian  love,  our  intercession  embraces  a  world 
lying  in  the  wicked  one.     What  will  not  a  faithful  parent  or 


ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION  51 

friend  do,  endure,  or  give,  in  the  measure  of  his  experience  and 
love  ?  The  sick-room,  the  risks  taken  in  the  counting-rooms  of 
our  cities,  the  acts  of  charity  and  benevolence  in  our  streets  and 
throughout  the  homes  of  our  poor — all  these  are  illustrations  and 
exhibitions  of  a  love  active  in  its  demonstrations.  It  would  be  a 
happy  thing  if  in  our  living  it  were  true  that,  though  our  love  at 
home  is  prudent  and  well  devised  in  its  measures  and  methods,  it 
did  not  always  stay  at  home,  but  could  reach  out  towards  those 
that  are  in  need,  not  of  luxuries,  but  of  the  very  necessaries  of 
body  and  of  soul.  Just  as  we  have  this  human  love  towards  our 
own  and  towards  those  that  are  about  us,  coupled  with  our  trust 
in  Christ,  does  every  sense  of  sympathy  and  every  desire  of 
affection  become  intercession.  Possessing  this  interest  in  the  in- 
estimable gift  of  Christ,  we  begin  to  look  at  every  child  and  every 
friend  we  have  with  a  perhaps  unuttered  but  yet  a  perfect  inter- 
cession, "  Oh,  that  Ishmael  might  live  before  God  !  "  Every 
interest  taken  in  the  sick,  the  sorrowing,  the  poor,  the  afflicted, 
will  instantly  change  into  an  act  of  intercession  to  the  great 
Physician  and  the  faithful  Friend  who  alone  can  relieve  ;  so  that 
wherever  such  a  loving  soul  can  send  a  thought,  he  can  send  a 
blessing.  As  our  heart  is  enlarged,  so  do  our  intercessions  become 
wider  and  wider  in  their  outreach. 

(5)  And  then,  all  gratitude  in  Christian  life  is  expressed  in 
Thanksgiving.  In  its  very  nature  it  recognizes  a  Giver.  It 
traces  every  blessing  back  to  His  hand.  It  is  on  the  alert  to 
appreciate  all  the  mercies,  little  and  great,  bitter  and  sweet. 
True  gratitude  is  conscious  of  undesert,  is  continually  depressed 
with  the  fear  of  infirmity  and  failure,  but  is  equally  satisfied 
with  love  and  carefulness.  It  matters  little  what  may  be  the 
shape  of  its  manifestations — how  God  the  Father  may  send  His 
blessing — in  wine  or  in  wormwood — it  still  cries  out,  **  The  Lord 
gave,  and  the  Lord  hath  taken  away ;  blessed  be  the  name  of  the 
Lord  !  "  Gurnall  says,  "  Who  that  understands  himself  will  value 
a  book  by  the  gilt  that  is  on  the  cover  ?  "  Who  that  can  appreci- 
ate the  mercy  of  God  will  judge  it  by  its  external  form  or  appear- 
ance ?  Gratitude  is  glad,  is  full  of  thanksgiving  at  the  beginning 
of  a  mercy.     It  does  not  wait  until  it  is  fully  revealed. 


52      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 


The  Address. 

But  before  Adoration  or  Confession,  before  any  of  the  elements 
of  prayer  are  even  begun,  there  is  a  great  matter  to  be  attended 
to  in  all  prayer.  It  is  the  name  of  Him  to  whom  prayer  is  to 
be  made.  How  do  we  address  God  when  we  approach  Him  in 
prayer  ?  What  name  do  we  give  to  God  when  we  pray  to  Him  ? 
What  do  we  call  Him  ?  When  we  pray,  what  do  we  say  ?  Jesus 
bids  us  say  "  Father  " — "  When  ye  pray,  say,  Father  "  (Luke  xi. 
2,  R.V.).     Do  we  say  "  Father  "  when  we  pray  ? 

It  is  not  a  matter  of  no  moment,  Jesus  never  commanded 
things  of  no  moment.  It  seems  to  be  in  the  hne  of  God's 
discipline.  If  we  may  follow  the  history  of  redemption  as  it  is 
at  present  set  forth  in  the  Old  Testament  (and  whatever  criticism 
may  discover  as  to  dates  and  documents,  the  present  arrangement 
of  the  Old  Testament  seems  purposely  made  for  edification), 
there  appear  to  be  stages  of  progress  marked  by  the  use  of  the 
name  of  God.     There  appears  to  be  three  great  steps. 

At  first  when  men  prayed,  they  seem  to  have  simply  said 
"  God  ".  This  continued  down  to  the  time  of  Moses  and  the  deli- 
verance from  Egypt.  Then  the  name  *'  Jehovah  "  was  revealed. 
Never  mind  whether  it  was  used  already,  according  to  our 
documents,  or  not.  Never  mind  where  it  came  from.  The  Old 
Testament  was  written  for  our  edification,  and  in  the  process  of 
edifying  us  it  seems  to  reveal  to  us  that  at  the  recovery  of  Israel 
from  the  bondage  of  Egypt  to  serve  the  living  God  this  name 
was  given.  Henceforth,  when  an  Israelite  prayed,  he  said 
"Jehovah".  Long  after  the  Exodus,  looking  back  on  all  the 
way,  the  pious  Israelite  could  say,  "  Jehovah,  thou  hast  been  our 
dwelling-place  in  all  generations".  But  when  Jesus  came,  He 
said  "  When  ye  pray,  say,  Father  ".  And  that  is  our  name  for 
God.     That  is  the  name  in  all  our  generations. 

Some  still  say  ''  God  ".  To  say  "  God  "  is  to  think  of  Him 
chiefly  as  Creator  and  Preserver.  It  is  to  put  Him,  perhaps, 
somewhat  far  away.  It  is  to  make  Him  somewhat  doubtful. 
George  Eliot  has  a  woman  in  Silas  Marner,  a  churchgoer  and 
Christian,  who  never  ventured  nearer  than  "  Them  as  are  above 


ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION  53 

us  ".  And  there  is  a  story  which,  though  it  be  not  true  in  par- 
ticular, is  perfectly  true  in  general,  that  an  infidel  took  to  praying 
once  because  he  feared  the  ship  was  sinking,  and  said,  "  O  God, 
if  there  be  a  God  ".  That  is  the  danger  of  saying  **  God  ".  We 
almost  add  ''if  there  be  a  God  ".  But  they  that  come  to  God 
must  believe  that  He  is. 

It  is  better  to  say  "Jehovah".  For  Jehovah  is  nearer  and 
surer.  If  it  is  not  so  evident  that  He  is  the  God  of  all  the  Earth, 
it  is  certain  that  He  is  the  God  of  Israel.  And  we  have  entered 
into  that  inheritance.  When  Moses  went  down  into  Egypt  he 
took  this  Name  with  him.  He  took  other  things  besides  this. 
He  took  the  wonder-working  rod.  It  was  wonderful  to  see  the 
rod  turn  into  a  serpent  when  Moses  threw  it  on  the  ground. 
But  the  rod  did  not  make  the  deepest  impression  upon  the  people 
who  were  crying  by  reason  of  the  bondage.  *'  When  they  heard 
that  Jehovah  had  visited  the  children  of  Israel,  and  that  he  had 
looked  upon  their  affliction,  then  they  bowed  their  heads  and 
worshipped." 

And  in  all  their  generations  thereafter  Jehovah  was  their 
God.  What  is  their  secret  ?  They  gave  us  our  Bible.  They 
gave  us  our  Religion.  They  gave  us  our  Saviour.  Other  nations 
have  offered  us  Bibles,  Religions,  and  even  Saviours,  but  we  will 
not  have  them.  Egypt  ofiers  us  its  Book  of  the  Dead.  The 
Book  of  the  Dead  ?  It  is  the  book  of  a  dead  nation  ;  we  are  not 
interested  in  it.  Greece  offers  the  world  a  religion — the  gods  of 
hoary  Olympus,  and  the  goddesses ;  but  the  world  has  been 
amused  at  it  or  ashamed.  What  is  Israel's  secret  ?  The  secret 
of  Israel  is  Jehovah.  The  prophets  lisped  '*  Jehovah  "  at  their 
mothers'  knee ;  and  they  came  to  Israel  and  said,  "  When  ye 
pray,  say  Jehovah  ".     That  is  the  secret  of  the  history  of  Israel. 

But  the  best  name  is  "Father".  Jehovah  came  with  the 
tabernacle  and  went  with  the  temple.  When  the  temple  was 
ready  to  depart,  Jesus  met  a  woman  of  Samaria.  "  Our  fathers," 
she  said,  "  worshipped  in  this  mountain ;  and  ye  say,  that  in 
Jerusalem  is  the  place  where  men  ought  to  worship."  It  depends 
on  whom  men  worship.  No  doubt  Jerusalem  is  the  place  where 
men  ought  to  worship  Jehovah.  But  "  the  hour  cometh,  when 
neither  in  this  mountain,  nor  in  Jerusalem,  shall  ye  worship  the 
Father  ". 


54      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

"  Father  "  is  best.  For  "  Father"  is  as  wide  as  "  God  "  and  as 
near  as  "  Jehovah  ".  As  wide  as  God  ?  Surely.  "  The  Father  of 
all  men " — we  have  good  Scripture  for  it.  And  yet  as  near  as 
Jehovah.  For,  though  it  is  true  that  God  loved  and  loves  the 
world,  yet  says  Jesus,  "  If  a  man  love  me,  he  will  keep  my  word  : 
and  my  Father  will  love  him  ".  There  is  a  wider  circle  of  love 
and  there  is  a  nearer.  He  is  **  the  Father  of  all  men,  but  especi- 
ally of  them  that  believe".  And  in  that  "especially"  lies  a 
great  difference.^ 

IT  The  Divine  names  in  the  86th  Psalm  are  very  frequent  and 
significant,  and  the  order  in  which  they  are  used  is  evidently 
intentional.  We  have  the  great  Covenant  name  of  Jehovah  set 
in  the  very  first  verse,  and  in  the  last  verse ;  as  if  to  bind  the 
whole  together  with  a  golden  circlet.  And  then,  in  addition,  it 
appears  once  in  each  of  the  other  two  sections  of  the  psalm. 
Then  we  have,  further,  the  name  of  God  employed  in  each  of  the 
sections  ;  and,  further,  the  name  of  Lord,  which  is  not  the  same 
as  Jehovah,  but  implies  the  simple  idea  of  superiority  and 
authority.  In  each  portion  of  the  psalm,  then,  we  see  the  writer 
laying  his  hand,  as  it  were,  upon  these  three  names — "  Jehovah," 
"  my  God,"  "  Lord  " — and  in  all  of  them  finding  grounds  for  his 
confidence  and  reasons  for  his  cry. 

Nothing  in  our  prayers  is  often  more  hollow  and  unreal  than 
the  formal  repetitions  of  the  sjdlables  of  that  Divine  name,  often 
but  to  fill  a  pause  in  our  thoughts.  But  to  "  call  upon  the  name 
of  the  Lord  "  means,  first  and  foremost,  to  bring  before  our  minds 
the  aspects  of  His  great  and  infinite  character,  which  are  gathered 
together  into  the  name  by  which  we  address  Him.  So  when  we 
say  ''Jehovah!  "  "Lord!  "  what  we  ought  to  mean  is  this,  that 
we  are  gazing  upon  that  majestic,  glorious  thought  of  Being,  self- 
derived,  self-motived,  self-ruled,  the  Being  of  Him  whose  name 
can  only  be  "  I  am  that  I  am  ".  Of  all  other  creatures  the  name 
is,  "  I  am  that  I  have  been  made,"  or  "  I  am  that  I  became,"  but 
of  Him  the  name  is,  "  I  am  that  I  am  ".  Nowhere  outside  of  Him- 
self is  the  reason  for  His  being,  nor  the  law  that  shapes  it,  nor 
the  aim  to  which  it  tends.  And  this  infinite,  changeless  Rock  is 
laid  for  our  confidence,  Jehovah  the  Eternal,  and  Self-subsisting, 
Self-sufl5cing  one. 

There  is  more  than  that  thought  in  this  wondrous  name,  for  it 
expresses  not  only  the  timeless,  unlimited,  and  changeless  Being 
of  God,  but  also  the  truth  that  He  has  entered  into  what  He 

^  The  Expository  Time&t  xvii.  101. 


ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION  55 

deigns  to  call  a  Covenant  with  us  men.  The  name  '*  Jehovah  "  is 
the  seal  of  that  ancient  Covenant,  of  which,  though  the  form 
has  vanished,  the  essence  abides  for  ever,  and  God  has  thereby 
bound  Himself  to  us  by  promises  that  cannot  be  abrogated.  So 
when  we  say,  "  O  Lord,"  we  summon  up  before  ourselves,  and 
grasp  as  the  grounds  of  our  confidence,  and  we  humbly  present 
before  Him  as  the  motives,  if  we  may  so  call  them,  for  His  action. 
His  own  infinite  Being  and  His  covenanted  grace. 

Then,  the  same  psalm  invokes  ''  My  God  ".  The  name  "  God  " 
implies,  in  itself,  simply  the  notion  of  power  to  be  reverenced.  But 
when  we  add  to  it  that  little  word  "  my  "  we  rise  to  the  wonder- 
ful thought  that  the  creature  can  claim  an  individual  relation  to 
Him,  and  in  some  wondrous  sense  a  possession  there.  The  tiny 
mica  flake  claims  kindred  with  the  Alpine  peak  from  *  which  it 
fell.  The  poor,  puny  hand,  that  can  grasp  so  little  of  the 
material  and  temporal,  can  grasp  all  of  God  that  it  needs. 

Then,  there  is  the  other  name,  "Lord,"  which  simply  ex- 
presses illimitable  sovereignty,  power  over  all  circumstances, 
creatures,  orders  of  being,  worlds,  and  cycles  of  ages.  Wherever 
He  is  He  rules,  and  therefore  my  prayer  can  be  answered  by 
Him.  When  a  child  cries  "Mother,"  it  is  more  than  all  other 
petitions.  A  dear  name  may  be  a  caress  when  it  comes  from 
loving  lips.  If  we  are  the  kind  of  Christians  that  we  ought  to 
be,  there  will  be  nothing  sweeter  to  us  than  to  whisper  to  our- 
selves, and  to  say  to  Him,  "  Abba  !  Father !  "  See  to  it  that  your 
calling  on  the  name  of  the  Lord  is  not  formal,  but  the  true  ap- 
prehension, by  a  believing  mind  and  a  loving  heart,  of  the  in- 
effable and  manifold  sweetnesses  which  are  hived  in  His  manifold 
names.^ 

11. 

ADORATIOIf. 

1.  In  the  Lord's  Prayer  Adoration  is  the  subject-  of  the  first 
petition.  "  Our  Father,  which  art  in  heaven ;  hallowed  be  Thy 
name."  In  Adoration  the  soul  comes  to  God  sensible  of  His 
love,  majesty,  holiness,  and  infinite  greatness  ;  feeling,  and  seek- 
ing more  fully  to  feel,  the  awe,  reverence,  and  holy  affection  due 
to  His  great  name ;  it  transcends  admiration  and  wonder ;  it  is  a 
blending  of  love  with  the  fervent  desire  that  all  the  world  should 
know  and  magnify  the  glory  of  the  Lord.  A  poet's  frenzy  or  a 
scientist's  noble  enthusiasm  may  fall  far  short  of  this  ;  for  to  the 

^  A.  Maclaren,  The  God  of  ihe  Amen,  58. 


56      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

fullest  tide  of  feeling  and  the  highest  reach  oi'  reason,  adoration 
adds  something  partaking  of  personal  allegiance.  Not  in  petition 
or  intercession,  not  in  confession  or  thanksgiving,  is  found  the 
highest  altitudes  of  worship,  but  in  adoration  and  consecration. 
Its  act  is  self -surrender  to  the  King,  and  its  language,  "Bless  the 
Lord,  O  my  soul ;  and  all  that  is  within  me,  bless  his  holy  name  ". 
Adoration  lives  not  as  a  separate  thing,  comes  not  always  to  de- 
finite expression,  but  is  present  in  all  reverent  invocation  of  God, 
and  flows  like  a  permanent  undercurrent  in  all  true  prayer.  It 
is  often  felt  when  unvoiced,  and  should  make  itself  heard  in  all 
audible  prayer  as  an  undertone. 

IT  Adoration  is  the  greatest  thing  in  man.  Reason  is  great, 
calculation  is  great,  imagination  and  analysis,  fused  together  and 
compacted  year  after  year  by  patient  thought,  present  a  picture 
of  greatness  to  which  every  intellect  does  homage.  But  adoration 
is  greater  than  all.  It  is  when  man,  in  the  fullness  of  all  his 
powers,  passes  outside  himself,  passes  into  the  Presence-Chamber 
of  the  Great  King,  and  there  casts  his  crown  before  the  throne 
and  worships  Him  that  Hveth  for  ever  and  ever — it  is  then  that 
man's  greatness  reaches  its  highest  point.  Self-emptying,  self- 
losing,  self -prostrating,  is  the  loftiest  outcome  of  human  energies. 
"  Not  unto  us,  O  Lord,  not  unto  us,  but  unto  thy  name  give  the 
praise."^ 

IT  William  Law  has  this  very  pertinent  word  in  his  Devout 
Life  :  "  When  you  begin  your  petitions  use  such  various  expres- 
sions of  the  attributes  of  God  as  may  make  you  most  sensible  of 
the  greatness  and  power  of  the  Divine  nature ".  And  then 
William  Law  gives  various  examples,  which,  I  am  bound  to  say, 
would  not  be  helpful  to  me,  as  they  would  imprison  my  spirit  in 
a  coat  of  mail.  But  I  want  to  emphasize  and  commend  the 
principle  of  it,  which  is,  that  our  fellowship  should  begin  with 
the  primary  elements  of  adoration  and  praise. 2 

IF  Begin,  therefore,  in  words  like  these :  "  O  Being  of  all 
beings,  Fountain  of  all  light  and  glory,  gracious  Father  of  men 
and  angels,  whose  universal  Spirit  is  everywhere  present  giving 
life  and  light  and  joy  to  all  angels  in  heaven  and  all  creatures 
upon  earth,"  etc.  For  these  representations  of  the  Divine  at- 
tributes, which  show  us,  in  some  degree,  the  Majesty  and  Great- 
ness of  God,  are  an  excellent  means  of  raising  our  hearts  into 

1  H.  M.  Butler,  Belief  in  Christ,  34. 

2  J.  H.  Jowett,  The  Silver  Lining,  147. 


ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION  57 

lively  acts  of  worship  and  adoration.  What  is  the  reason  that 
most  people  are  so  much  affected  with  this  petition  in  the  burial 
service  of  our  church :  "  Yet,  O  Lord  God  most  holy,  O  Lord 
most  mighty,  0  holy  and  most  merciful  Saviour,  deliver  us  not 
into  the  bitter  pains  of  eternal  death  "  ?  It  is  because  the  joining 
together  so  many  great  expressions  gives  such  a  description  of 
the  greatness  of  the  Divine  Majesty  as  naturally  affects  every 
sensible  mind.^ 

2.  Adoration  is  to  be  distinguished  from  Worship,  from  Praise, 
from  Thanksgiving,  and  from  Admiration. 

(1)  Adoration  differs  from  worship  as  being  somewhat 
narrower  in  its  idea  and  also  somewhat  more  intense.  Wor- 
ship covers  the  whole  range  of  devotional  duty,  including  its 
outward  order  and  observances.  Adoration  takes  us,  as  it  were, 
to  the  heart  and  sanctuary  of  worship.  It  concentrates  and 
lifts  the  thought,  till  it  is  supremely  occupied  with  those  relations 
between  the  worshipper  and  the  Worshipped  which  bring  the 
worshipper  spiritually  to  his  knees,  bowing  his  face  to  the  earth, 
and  filling  his  consciousness  full  of  a  sense  of  the  greatness  and 
glory  of  the  Worshipped,  and  of  the  worshipper's  total  depend- 
ence upon  Him.  True,  all  worship  involves  in  its  idea,  more  or 
less,  the  call  to  revere  and  to  submit.  But  to  adoration  that 
attitude  is,  in  effect,  its  whole  idea. 

IF  There  is  in  the  heart  of  every  true  worshipper  a  profound 
sense  of  humility  and  self-abasement.  Pride,  self -righteousness, 
and  self-sufficingness  have  their  source  in  ignorance  of  God. 
The  angels  of  heaven  hide  their  faces  in  His  presence  and  cast 
their  crowns  before  His  throne,  and  thus  say  in  effect,  "  We  are 
not  worthy  to  behold  Thy  glory ;  all  that  we  are  and  have  cometh 
from  Thy  love ;  our  existence,  happiness,  dignity,  and  immortality 
we  owe  to  Thee."  The  knowledge  of  Him  and  the  vision  of  His 
glory  should  produce  the  same  effects  in  our  minds. ^ 

(2)  Praise  is  not  usually  spoken  of  as  prayer,  since  its  ex- 
pression is  always  associated  with  music ;  but  the  heart's  desire, 
of  which  psalm  and  song  are  but  the  utterance,  is  truly  com- 
munion with  the  Eternal.  In  one  respect  also  praise  joins  ador- 
ation in  a  contrast  over  against  all  other  acts  of  devotion.  In 
confession,  petition,  and  thanksgiving,  the  worshipper's  attitude 

^  William  Law,  A  Serious  Call.  ^  T.  Jones,  The  Divine  Order,  79. 


58      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

is  that  of  human  need,  consciousness  of  self  mingling  with  the 
thought  of  God  ;  but  in  adoration  and  in  praise  it  is  otherwise  ; 
here  no  thought  of  self  remains,  but  the  spirit  soaring  on  glad 
wing  to  God  dwells  in  rapture  on  His  all-glorious  perfections ; 
sense  of  self  is  lost  in  that  divinest  joy  a  human  heart  can  know. 
Praise  addressed  to  God  in  name  and  memory  of  Jesus  Christ 
rises  inevitably  into  adoration.  Isaiah,  transported  by  faith  into 
the  inner  sanctuary,  was  rapt  into  the  worship  of  the  seraphim, 
and  joined  in  spirit  in  the  unending  adoration  of  the  Triune  God 
— "  Holy,  holy,  holy,  Lord  God  of  Sabaoth ;  the  whole  earth  is 
full  of  thy  glory".  The  herald  angels  poured  forth  upon  the 
plains  of  Bethlehem  the  song  of  heaven,  "  Glory  to  God  in  the 
highest  "  ;  and  our  sad  earth  heard,  and  was  comforted. 

Angels,  help  us  to  adore  Him  ; 
Ye  behold  Him  face  to  face ! 

But  even  these  bright  intelligences  are  unable  to  show  forth  all 
His  praise. 

IF  No  doubt  the  angels  think  themselves  as  insufficient  for  the 
praises  of  the  Lord  as  we  do.^ 

IF  It  is  reported  of  John  Janeway  that  often  in  bhe  hour  of 
secret  prayer  he  scarcely  knew  whether  he  were  "  in  the  body, 
or  out  of  the  body  ".  Tersteegen  said  to  some  friends  who  had 
gathered  round  him,  "  1  sit  here  and  talk  with  you,  but  within  is 
•the  eternal  adoration,  unceasing  and  undisturbed".  Wodrow 
relates  that  on  one  occasion  Mr.  Carstairs  was  invited  to  take 
part  in  communion  services  at  Calder,  near  Glasgow.  He  was 
wonderfully  assisted,  and  had  "  a  strange  gale  through  all  the 
sermon  ".  His  hearers  were  affected  in  an  unusual  degree  :  glory 
seemed  to  fill  the  house.  A  Christian  man  that  had  been  at  the 
table,  and  was  obliged  to  come  out  of  the  church,  pressing  to  get 
in  again,  could  not  succeed  for  some  time,  but  stood  without  the 
door,  wrapt  up  in  the  thoughts  of  that  glory  that  was  in  the 
house,  for  nearly  half-an-hour,  and  could  think  of  nothing  else.'^ 

(3)  Thanksgiving  is  that  department  of  prayer  which  makes 
grateful  recognition  of  the  fact  that  "  every  good  gift  and  every 
perfect  gift  is  from  above,  and  cometh  down  from  the  Father  of 
lights  ".     Although  not  enjoined  explicitly  in  the  Lord's  Prayer 

1  John  Livingstone's  Diary,  14  December,  1634  (Wodrow  Society). 
«  D.  M.  Molntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  97. 


ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION  59 

it  is  present  there  as  an  atmosphere,  and  indeed,  as  such,  should 
permeate  all  worship.  The  very  petition,  "  Give  us  this  day  our 
daily  bread,"  recognizes  God  as  the  All -Giver  to  whom  man  must 
look  for  blessing,  and  to  whom,  by  all  the  worthy  instincts  of  his 
nature,  he  is  taught  to  return  thanksgiving.  Not  merely  like 
the  flowers,  unconsciously  exhaling  the  incense-sweetness  of  a 
fragrant  life ;  but,  because  man  is  more  than  a  flower,  he  is  en- 
joined by  Scripture  as  well  as  prompted  by  intelligence  to  give 
glad  utterance  to  his  gratitude. 

IT  It  is  a  selfish  doctrine  which  altogether  confounds  thanks- 
giving and  praise.  The  "  Exhortation  "  distinguishes  the  two. 
To  render  thanks  for  the  great  benefits  received  at  His  hands  : 
that  is  thanksgiving.  To  set  forth  His  most  worthy  praise ;  to 
tell,  that  is,  what  He  is  in  Himself :  that  is  adoration.^ 

H  Although,  in  devotion,  we  neither  can  nor  ought  to  be 
always  drawing  the  line  with  the  precision  of  a  dogmatic  treatise, 
it  is  practically  important  to  distinguish  between  adoration  and 
thanksgiving.  In  adoration  we  contemplate,  as  in  the  Proper 
Preface  for  Trinity  Sunday,  the  glory  and  the  goodness  of  God 
in  themselves.  Adoration,  "  the  speech  not  of  aliens  but  of  sons," 
is  the  homage  due  to  Him  from  His  created,  redeemed,  and  sancti- 
fied children.  In  thanksgiving,  His  glory  and  His  goodness  are 
regarded  as  revealed  in  His  mercies,  whether  general  or  particular, 
bestowed  upon  our  race  and  ourselves.  The  two  strains  are 
blended  in  the  opening  sentence  of  the  Magnificat : — 

"  My  soul  doth  magnify  the  Lord, 
And  my  spirit  hath  rejoiced  in  God  my  Saviour  ".2 

(4)  Adoration  is  more  than  admiration.  The  early  Christian 
Church  did  not  content  herself  with  "admiring"  Jesus  Christ. 
She  adored  Him.  She  approached  His  glorious  Person  with  that 
very  tribute  of  prayer,  of  self-prostration,  of  self-surrender  by 
which  all  serious  Theists,  whether  Christian  or  non -Christian,  are 
accustomed  to  express  their  felt  relationship  as  creatures  to  the 
Almighty  Creator.  For  as  yet  it  was  not  supposed  that  a  higher 
and  truer  knowledge  of  the  Infinite  God  would  lead  man  to 
abandon  the  sense  and  the  expression  of  complete  dependence 
upon  Him  and  of  unmeasured  indebtedness  to  Him,  which  befits 

•  C.  J.  Vaughan,  Revelation,  156.  '  A.  J.  Worlledge,  Prayer,  216. 


6o      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

a  reasonable  creature  whom  God  has  made,  and  whom  God  owns 
and  can  dispose  of,  when  such  a  creature  is  dealing  with  God. 
As  yet  it  was  not  imagined  that  this  bearing  would  or  could  be 
exchanged  for  the  more  easy  demeanour  of  an  equal,  or  of  one 
deeming  himself  scarcely  less  than  an  equal,  who  is  intelligently 
appreciating  the  existence  of  a  remarkably  wise  and  powerful 
Being,  entitled  by  His  activities  to  a  very  large  share  of  specu- 
lative attention.  The  Church  simply  adored  God  ;  and  she  adored 
Jesus  Christ,  as  believing  Him  to  be  God.  Nor  did  she  destroy 
the  significance  of  this  act  by  conceiving  that  admiration  differs 
from  adoration  only  in  degree,  that  a  sincere  admiration  is 
practically  equivalent  to  adoration,  that  adoration  after  all  is 
only  admiration  raised  to  the  height  of  an  enthusiasm. 

IT  Contrasting  the  Christian  belief  in  a  God  who  can  work 
miracles  with  the  "scientific"  belief  in  a  God  who  is  the  slave  of 
"law,"  Mr.  Lecky  remarks  that  the  former  "predisposes  us  most 
to  prayer,"  the  latter  to  "reverence  and  admiration".  Here 
the  antithesis  between  "reverence"  and  "prayer"  seems  to  im- 
ply that  the  latter  word  is  used  in  the  narrow  sense  of  petition 
for  specific  blessings,  instead  of  in  the  wider  sense  which  embraces 
the  whole  compass  of  the  soul's  devotional  activity,  and,  among 
other  things,  adoration.  Still,  if  Mr.  Lecky  had  meant  to  include 
under  "  reverence  "  anything  higher  than  we  yield  to  the  highest 
forms  of  human  greatness,  he  would  scarcely  have  coupled  it  with 
"  admiration  ".^ 

3.  The  element  of  adoration  in  worship  has  been  frequently 
criticised.  We  offer  to  God,  it  is  said,  what  we  would  not  offer 
to  a  man.  But  we  must  look  at  prayer  from  the  human  rather 
than  from  the  Divine  side.  Whether  God  needs  such  praise  is 
one  question,  and  whether  man  needs  to  offer  it  is  quite  another. 
There  are  moments  of  warmth  and  enthusiasm  in  which  we  do 
not  hesitate  to  express  to  our  friends  our  praise  of  them,  moments 
when  we  cannot  restrain  ourselves,  but  have  to  give  utterance  to 
our  feeling  towards  them ;  and  this  is  not  flattery,  but  only  the 
natural  outpouring  of  our  love  and  appreciation.  So  it  is  in 
prayer.  It  is  one  of  the  ways  by  which  man  climbs  upward ; 
and  when  in  his  love  and  adoration  he  utters  his  praise  to  God, 
that  praise  is  not  meant  to  influence  God ;  it  influences  the  man 

1  H.  P.  Liddon,  The  Divinity  of  our  Lord,  367. 


ADDRESS   AND  ADORATION  6i 

himself ;  it  helps  to  keep  before  him,  to  fix  in  his  mind  and  heart, 
the  object  of  his  devotion. 

IT  Why  does  God  want  so  much  to  be  praised  ?  A  good  man 
does  not  at  all  want  to  be  praised ;  a  good  man  dislikes  it  if  he 
is  too  much  praised,  especially  to  his  face.  Why  does  God  want 
to  be  praised  ?  Why  is  the  whole  of  religion  said  to  be  praising 
God  ?  Why,  for  instance,  in  the  Ordination  prayer  is  it  said, 
*'  He  [Christ]  gathered  together  a  great  flock  in  all  parts  of  the 
world  to  set  forth  the  eternal  praise  of  Thy  holy  Name  "  ? — one 
of  the  most  beautiful  sentences  in  the  Ordination  Service. 

I  can  remember  when  I  was  a  young  man  that  this  was  a 
real  difficulty  to  me.  I  could  not  understand  why  it  was.  It 
seemed  almost  selfishness  on  the  part  of  God  to  want  so  much 
praise.  In  order  to  answer  that,  I  want  you  to  call  to  mind  a 
picture  which  seems  to  me  one  of  the  most  inspired  ever  painted. 
You  have  probably  seen  it,  or  seen  representations  of  it.  It  is 
called  ''  The  Triumph  of  Love ".  It  is  one  of  Watts'  pictures, 
and  it  represents  a  slim  and  beautiful  figure  trampling  upon 
apparently  dead  bodies,  with  outstretched  hands  and  upturned 
face  to  God.  I  ask  myself,  what  is  the  meaning  of  that  picture  ? 
Here,  clearly,  is  a  figure  in  praise.  Love  has  triumphed,  and 
Love  praises.  Is  God  a  selfish  God  who  simply  craves  for  con- 
gratulations ?  See  what  the  painter-poet  meant.  What  he 
pictured  was  this :  pure  love  struggling  down  here  against  all  its 
foes,  with  vice  and  drink  and  gambling  and  malice  and  hatred, 
all  against  it.  Love  finds  the  battle  very  hard,  beset  on  all  sides, 
almost  trampled  down,  just  as  you  see  to-day  some  good  man 
almost  trampled  down  by  the  forces  against  him ;  or  some  man 
almost  sneered  out  of  his  reUgion  in  the  City  office ;  or  a  boy 
laughed  at  for  being  firm,  who  almost  gives  up  his  religion 
altogether  ;  or  a  reformer  in  London  trying  to  get  rid  of  drink, 
gambling,  vice,  proffigacy,  who  goes  down  sometimes  under  the 
organized  force  against  him.  But  Love  is  struggling  like  that 
always,  and  just  when  Love  is  almost  conquered.  Love  finds  a 
power  come  down  from  Heaven  and  enter  into  him,  finds  new 
strength  put  into  him,  finds  hope  in  his  heart,  finds  his  faith 
burning  again,  finds  a  strength  not  his  own  as  he  grapples  with 
those  enemies  against  which  he  fights,  and  at  last,  to  his  intense 
relief  and  to  his  glorious  triumph,  he  conquers  in  a  strength 
which  is  not  his  own.  These  foes  of  the  human  race  have  gone 
under  his  feet,  and  he  knows  that  something  is  tingling  in  his 
veins  which  is  not  his  own  :  a  will  not  his  own  has  grasped  his; 
a  heart  not  his  own  has  warmed  his  ;  he  hears  in  his  ears  a  voice 
not  his  own,  and  he  is  all  triumph,  and  he  looks  up  and  he  praises. 


62      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

Is  that  selfishness  on  the  part  of  God  ?  Why,  God  has  been  in 
the  thick  of  the  battle ;  God  came  down  on  the  Cross,  and  bore 
the  worst  for  love — God  was  the  Love  who  was  slain.  It  is, 
then,  for  our  sake  we  have  to  praise,  and  not  for  God's  sake. 
God  wants  His  child  to  love  Him ;  He  wants  His  child's  response 
as  any  father  does,  but  it  is  for  our  sake  that  He  wants  us  to 
praise.^ 

IF  I  read  lately  in  an  atheistic  tract  a  sentence  to  this  effect : 
"  Why  should  the  omnipotent  God  be  so  weak  as  to  be  flattered 
by  the  praise  of  His  creatures  ? "  He  is  not  flattered  ;  He  is 
gratified.  He  is  unconscious  of  any  benefit  to  Himself  ;  but  He 
sees  a  symptom  of  development  in  His  children.  He  feels  that 
His  solitude  is  broken,  that  kindred  spirits  have  arisen  to  share 
His  nature.  What  a  man  praises  either  in  God  or  his  brother  is 
an  indication  of  the  height  which  he  has  himself  attained.  He 
may  be  far  behind  in  life.  But  his  praise  is  the  measure  of  him. 
It  predicts  his  coming  glory.  It  tells  what  he  will  be  to-morrow. 
It  is  the  primrose  of  his  year.  The  cold  may  be  still  around 
him ;  his  environment  may  be  yet  barren  and  bare.  But  the  prim- 
rose— the  putting  forth  of  his  admiration — shows  that  summer 
is  on  the  way,  and  that  ere  long  the  land  will  be  laden  with  fruits 
and  flowers.  That  is  why  the  heart  of  the  heavenly  Father 
rejoices  in  the  creature's  praise.  It  is  a  sign  that  His  child  is 
growing — growing  into  sympathy  with  a  Father's  mind,  growing 
into  fellowship  with  a  Father's  heart.  God's  joy  in  praise  is  a 
paternal  joy.^ 

IF  It  is  interesting  to  notice  that  even  in  Comte's  religion  of 
humanity  prayer  had  an  important  place.  Every  day  had  its 
saint,  and  the  prayer  consisted  in  the  repetition  of  the  virtues  of 
the  saint  and  the  desire  that  they  might  be  fulfilled  in  the  life  of 
the  worshipper.  There  was  no  response  from  the  saint  who  was 
thus  worshipped,  but  there  was  believed  to  be  an  inspiring  effect 
upon  the  worshipper.^ 

IF  Dr.  A.  J.  Gordon  describes  the  impression  made  upon  his 
mind  by  intercourse  with  Joseph  Rabinowitz,  whom  Dr.  Delitzsch 
considered  the  most  remarkable  Jewish  convert  since  Saul  of 
Tarsus  :  "  We  shall  not  soon  forget  the  radiance  that  would  come 
into  his  face  as  he  expounded  the  Messianic  psalms  at  our  morn- 
ing or  evening  worship,  and  how,  as  here  and  there  he  caught 
a  glimpse  of  the  suffering  or  glorified  Christ,  he  would  suddenly 

*  A.  F.  Winnington  Ingram,  The  Love  of  tlie  Trinity,  819. 

'  G.  Matheson,  Bests  by  tJie  River,  324. 

^C.  C.  Everett,  Theism  atui  the  Christian  Faith,  462. 


ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION  63 

lift  his  hands  and  his  eyes  to  heaven  in  a  burst  of  adoration, 
exclaiming  with  Thomas,  after  he  had  seen  the  nail-prints,  '  My 
Lord,  and  my  God  1 '  "  ^ 

4.  Adoration  is  real  prayer ;  if  we  say — 

Holy,  holy,  holy,  Lord  God  Almighty  ! 

Early  in  the  morning  our  song  shall  rise  to  Thee ; 
Holy,  holy,  holy,  merciful  and  mighty, 

God  in  Three  Persons,  Blessed  Trinity  ! 

or  if  we  say — 

O  Jesus,  King  most  wonderful, 

Thou  Conqueror  renowned, 
Thou  Sweetness  most  ineffable, 

In  whom  all  joys  are  found, 

this  is  real  prayer,  although  we  ask  for  nothing.  It  is  real 
prayer  although,  if  we  were  to  start  to  analyze  all  the  expressions 
used,  we  might  find  ourselves  in  the  very  thick  of  intellectual 
perplexity.  It  is  real  prayer,  because,  if  we  use  those  words 
with  sincerity  and  in  reverence  and  soul-sensitiveness  to  God,  we 
cannot  fail  to  experience  such  pure  emotions  and  such  Godward 
aspirations  as  serve  to  establish  and  develop  in  us  that  spiritual 
attitude  towards  God  through  which,  though  it  may  be  only  in 
terms  of  love  and  not  in  terms  of  understanding,  we  realize  the 
relation  between  our  soul  and  Him.  In  such  adoration  we  bring 
our  soul  into  the  ineffable  light  of  God's  presence ;  we  do  not 
seek  actively  to  understand  Him,  but  passively  we  let  our  soul 
lie  in  His  sight ;  in  quiet  and  lowly  ways  we  anticipate  that 
ecstasy  of  which  Faber  sang — 

Father  of  Jesus,  love's  Reward  ! 

What  rapture  will  it  be. 
Prostrate  before  Thy  Throne  to  lie, 

And  gaze  and  gaze  on  Thee ! 

We  come  into  the  Divine  presence  and  let  the  light  shine  on  us, 
and  Divine  influences  play  upon  us ;  we  rest  in  the  Lord.  That 
is  real  prayer ;  it  fulfils  the  prime  function  of  prayer ;  it  brings 
us  closer  to  God ;  it  opens  avenues  to  the  inflowing  of  His  life ; 
and  such  prayer  is  answered. 

1 D.  M.  Mclntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  98. 


64      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IT  Just  as  the  free  playing  of  the  sunlight  upon  a  garment 
cleanses  it  from  lurking  impurity ;  just  as  the  summer  sun  kisses 
the  apples  in  the  orchard  until  they  blush  for  very  gladness ;  so 
is  our  adoration  of  Him  who  is  the  eternal  Light  of  light  answered 
in  the  purity,  the  beauty,  and  the  joy  which  the  sense  of  His 
over-shadowing  presence  and  the  suffering  of  His  all-embracing 
influence  give  to  our  lives.^ 

IF  This  is  the  prerogative  of  song,  that  it  not  only  furnishes  a 
medium  for  the  expression  of  feeling,  but  awakens  the  very  feel- 
ing of  which  it  is  the  expression ;  and  the  poet,  for  the  moment, 
is  the  master  of  the  memory,  the  hope,  the  confidence,  and  the 
imagination  of  multitudes,  bearing  them  away  upon  the  tide  of 
his  verse  to  regions  of  enterprise,  of  courage,  and  of  faith,  which 
they  could  never  have  reached  by  the  lonely  prompting  of  their 
own  thoughts.  This  is  pre-eminently  the  power  of  sacred  song. 
When  we  sing  together  the  strains  of  a  divine  poet,  whose  heart 
has  been  touched  by  the  fire  that  kindles  the  muse  of  seraphs, 
we  are  in  immediate  communion  with  the  Spirit  of  Jesus :  and 
the  psalm,  the  hymn,  or  the  spiritual  song  does  not  end  in  a 
momentary  delectation  of  the  fancy ;  it  quickens  our  faith  to  hear 
others  chant  the  assurance  of  theirs ;  it  fortifies  our  courage  to 
assume  the  victory  of  others ;  it  permanently  raises  the  tone  of 
our  life  to  dwell  in  thought  even  for  a  few  moments  with  the 
societies  and  choirs  of  the  upper  sanctuary. 

Triumphant  host !  they  never  cease 

To  laud  and  magnify 
The  Triune  God  of  holiness. 

Whose  glory  fills  the  sky  ; 

Whose  glory  to  this  earth  extends, 

*When  God  Himself  imparts, 
And  the  whole  Trinity  descends 
Into  our  faithful  hearts.^ 

5.  Adoration  is  the  expression  of  two  emotions — confidence 
and  fear.  Separately  these  emotions  are  incomplete ;  they  seem 
even  contradictory.  They  are  blended  in  perfect  harmony  in  God 
as  seen  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  in  that  adoration  which 
recognizes  the  love  that  gave  and  the  holiness  that  required  the 
Son  to  death. 

*  E.  W.  Lewis,  Some  Views  of  Modern  Theology,  41. 
2  E.  E.  Jenkins,  Life  and  Christ,  292. 


ADDRESS  AND  ADORATION  65 

IT  I  read,  the  other  day,  two  Boston  sonnets,  entitled  **  Trust," 
and  making  of  the  crystalline  window  of  one  of  the  deepest 
human  experiences  an  opening  through  which  to  look  into  the 
sky  behind  the  sky  : — 

I  know  that  thou  art  true,  and  strong  and  pure ; 
My  forehead  on  thy  palm  I  fall  asleep, 
My  sentinels  with  thee  no  vigils  keep, 

Though  elsewhere  never  without  watch  secure. 

How  restful  is  thy  palm  !     I  life  endure, 

These  stranger  souls  whose  veils  I  shyly  sweep. 
These  doubts  what  secrets  hide  within  the  deep 

Because  aglow  within  the  vast  obscure. 

Thy  hand  is  whitest  light !     My  Peace  art  thou, 
My  firm  green  isle  within  a  troubled  sea ; 
And  lying  here  and  looking  upward  now 

I  ask,  if  thou  art  this,  what  God  must  be — 
If  thus  I  rest  within  thy  goodness,  how 
In  goodness  of  the  Infinite  degree  ? 

But  there  are  lightnings  wherever  there  is  love,  for  character 
cannot  have  one  side  without  having  two  sides — we  cannot  love 
good  and  not  abhor  evil ;  and  so  the  second  sonnet,  equally  true 
to  trust,  contrasts  with  the  first : — 

This  crystal  soul  of  thine,  were  it  outspread. 
Until  the  drop  should  fill  the  universe, 
How  in  it  might  the  angels'  wings  immerse, 

And  wake  and  sleep  the  living  and  the  dead ; 

Bereaved  eyes  bathe ;  rest  Doubt  its  tossing  head ; 
Swim  the  vast  worlds ;  dissolve  Guilt's  icy  curse ; 
And  sightless,  if  but  loyal,  each  disperse 

Fear  by  full  trust,  and,  by  devotion,  dread. 

And  yet  these  perfect  eyes  in  which  mine  sleep 
Would  not  be  sweet  were  not  their  lightning  deep ; 
In  softest  skies  the  swiftest  firebolts  dwell ; 

Thine  eyes  mix  dew  and  flame,  and  both  are  well. 
If  thus  I  fear  this  soul,  O  God,  how  Thee, 
Both  Love's  and  Lightning's  full  Infinity  ?  ^ 

*  Joseph  Cook,  Monday  Lectures,  i.  58. 


IV. 

Confession. 


Literature. 

Harford-Battersby,  C.  F.,  Daily  :  A  Help  to  Private  Prayer  (1910). 

Jowett,  B.,  Sermons  on  Faith  and  Doctrine  (1901). 

Knight,  G.  H.,  In  the  Secret  of  His  Presence  (1905). 

McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 

Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

Maclagan,  P.  J.,  The  Gospel  View  of  Things  (1906). 

Monrad,  D.  G.,  The  World  of  Prayer  (1879). 

Roberts,  J.  E.,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions  (1908). 

Singer,  S.,  Sermons  and  Memoir  (1908). 

Sowter,  G.  A.,  Trial  and  Triumph  (1910). 

Vaughan,  C.  J.,  Liturgy  and  Worship  of  the  Church  of  England  (1867). 

Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 

Harvard  Theological  Review,  iv.  (1911)  489  (M.  W.  Calkins). 


68 


Confession. 

The  Bible  gives  an  important  place  to  confession  of  sin.  Its 
message  may  be  summed  up  in  the  words,  "If  we  confess  our 
sins,  he  is  faithful  and  righteous  to  forgive  us  our  sins,  and  to 
cleanse  us  from  all  unrighteousness  ".  The  Old  Testament  teaches 
that  confession  of  sins  is  the  necessary  expression  of  true  repent- 
ance, and  is  also  the  condition  of  the  Divine  forgiveness.  And 
though  confession  of  sins  is  only  once  expressly  named  in  the 
Gospels,  the  New  Testament  takes  full  account  of  its  importance. 
"  Jesus  came  into  Galilee,  preaching  the  gospel  of  God,  and  saying. 
The  time  is  fulfilled,  and  the  kingdom  of  God  is  at  hand  :  repent 
ye,  and  believe  in  the  gospel."  His  last  recorded  words  declare 
that  "  repentance  and  remission  of  sins  should  be  preached  "  in 
His  name  unto  all  nations,  and  neither  repentance  nor  remission 
of  sins  is  considered  possible  from  the  Biblical  standpoint  until 
sins  are  confessed.  "  Father,  I  have  sinned,"  said  the  prodigal 
when  he  came  to  himself.  The  publican  who  went  down  to  his 
house  justified  had  smitten  upon  his  heart,  saying,  "  God  be 
merciful  to  me  a  sinner,"  whilst  the  Pharisee  whom  our  Lord 
pilloried  made  no  confession  of  sin.  If  we  desire  to  claim  the 
promises  of  pardon  for  our  sins,  we  must  fulfil  the  condition  by 
confessing  our  sins.  "  With  the  mouth  confession  is  made  unto 
salvation."  "  The  Scripture  moveth  us  in  sundry  places  to 
acknowledge  and  confess  our  manifold  sins  and  wickedness,  and 
that  we  should  not  dissemble  nor  cloak  them  before  the  face  of 
Almighty  God  our  Heavenly  Father,  but  confess  them  with  an 
humble,  lowly,  penitent,  and  obedient  heart,  to  the  end  that  we 
may  obtain  forgiveness  of  the  same  by  His  infinite  goodness 
and  mercy." 

1.  In  confession  the  worshipper's  keenest! consciousness  is  of 
his  weakness,  his  guilt,  his  unworthiness.  "  O  my  God,  my  sins 
are  many,  great  are  my  transgressions,"  is  the  confession  of  the 

69 


70      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

sinner  in  one  of  the  penitential  psalms  of  the  Babylonians.  "  I 
acknowledge  my  transgressions  ;  and  my  sin  is  ever  before  me," 
says  a  Hebrew  psalmist.  Yet  always,  mingled  with  the  con- 
sciousness of  his  own  sin,  the  penitent  has  the  vivid  consciousness 
of  God,  else  this  were  no  religious  experience,  and  the  conscious- 
ness of  intercourse  with  God,  else  it  were  no  prayer.  In 
penitential  prayer  I  am  conscious  of  my  weakness,  my  failure, 
my  sin,  not  as  a  merely  individual  experience,  and  not  simply  as 
a  contravention  of  human  law,  an  attack  on  society,  a  wrong  to 
my  fellow-men,  but  in  its  relation  to  God.  I  am  conscious  of  my 
weakness  as  contrasted  with  His  strength,  of  my  sin  as  opposition 
to  His  will.  And  I  cry,  in  the  acuteness  of  this  personal  contact 
of  sinning  soul  with  Divine  Self,  '*  Against  thee,  thee  only,  have 
I  sinned  ". 

2.  The  formal  confessions  of  later  times  in  the  Bible  always 
acknowledge  the  justice  of  God.  "  Thou  our  God  hast  punished 
us  less  than  our  iniquities  deserve,"  and  "  Thou  art  just  in  all 
that  is  come  upon  us  ".  So  the  worshippers  can  do  nothing  but 
throw  themselves  upon  the  marvellous  mercy  of  God.  "  To  the 
Lord  our  God  belong  mercies  and  forgivenesses."  He  is  ready  to 
blot  out  as  a  thick  cloud  their  transgressions.  He  is  a  God  that 
pardons  iniquity.  True,  it  is  this  persistent  goodness  of  God — 
what  Ezra  twice  calls  His  "  manifold  mercies  " — that  makes  their 
wickedness  so  heinous.  They  had  sinned  against  a  light  that  had 
shone  as  the  noon-day.  But  as  that  mercy  was  the  deepest  thing 
in  the  Divine  nature,  it  could  always  be  depended  upon  by  those 
who  turned  to  it  in  sincerity  and  truth.  So  they  confess  in  hope. 
"  For  we  do  not  present  our  supplications  before  thee  for  our 
righteousnesses,  but  for  thy  great  mercies ; "  and  a  passionate 
earnestness  rings  through  the  words  with  which  this  prayer  con- 
cludes :  "  0  Lord,  hear ;  O  Lord,  forgive ;  O  Lord,  hearken  and 
do  ;  defer  not,  for  thine  own  sake,  0  my  God  ". 

I. 

General  and  Particular. 

Confession  is  of  two  kinds :  general  and  particular.  That 
which  we  use  in  public  is  of  necessity  general.     And  this  not  only 


CONFESSION  71 

because  it  is  used  by  all,  which  is  probably  the  meaning  of  the 
expression  in  the  Eubric,  "  A  general  Confession,  to  be  said  of  the 
whole  Congregation  after  the  Minister,  all  kneeling  "  ;  but  also  be- 
cause, being  used  by  all,  it  cannot  enter  into  the  particulars  of 
individual  sin  ;  it  can  only  express,  in  strong  terms,  and  in  broad 
lines  of  description,  that  which  is  the  true  character  of  all  hearts 
and  lives,  when  the  light  of  God's  presence  and  of  God's  holiness 
is  thrown  upon  them.  "  We  have  erred  and  strayed.  .  .  .  We 
have  followed  our  own  devices.  .  .  .  We  have  offended.  .  .  . 
We  have  left  undone  the  right.  .  .  .  We  have  done  the  wrong.  .  .  . 
There  is  no  health  in  us."  This  is  an  instance  of  general  confes- 
sion. Now  confession  of  this  kind  is  not  to  be  despised.  Though 
general,  it  is  not  necessarily  vague.  No  doubt  it  may  be  made 
vague  by  any  of  us.  But  where  there  is  a  serious  desire  to  take 
a  true  view  of  our  condition  as  fallen  creatures,  and  as  actually 
sinful  and  sinning  creatures,  in  the  sight  of  a  pure  and  holy  God, 
there  is  great  force,  and  great  benefit  in  this  outpouring  of  a 
general  self-lamentation  in  the  all-hearing  ear  ;  there  is  something 
deeply  real  in  this  plunging  of  the  universal  being  into  the 
fountain  opened  for  sin  and  for  uncleanness,  this  gathering  of  the 
whole  experience,  as  the  course  of  life  has  brought  it  to  us,  into 
one  sweeping  act  of  self-condemnation  and  self-renunciation,  con- 
straining us  to  throw  ourselves  absolutely  and  without  exception 
upon  the  mere  mercy  and  compassion  of  a  pitying,  a  long- 
suffering,  and  a  redeeming  God.     Let  no  man  despise  it. 

But  then  this  general  confession  must  be  made  real,  and  kept 
real,  by  that  which  is  minute,  individual,  particular.  Even  in  the 
congregation,  under  the  veil  of  this  general  language,  there  is 
time  and  place  for  something  with  which  no  stranger  can  inter- 
meddle. These  hearts  which  are  unfolding  themselves  at  the 
mercy-seat  of  God  do  not  lose  their  individuality  by  the  presence 
of  other  hearts  around  them.  Even  the  general  confession  is  the 
sum  of  a  thousand  particular  confessions,  and  then  rises  with  full 
meaning  into  the  ear  of  God  only  when  it  is  prompted  by  the  per- 
sonal experiences  of  a  multitude  of  persons,  each  of  whom  is 
grieved  and  wearied  by  the  heavy  burden  of  his  own  separate 
sins. 

IF  Multitudes  of  devout  souls  have  found  the  noble  language 
of  the  "  General  Confession  "  to  be  a  means  of  grace.     There  is 


72      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

something  peculiarly  solemn  in  a  united  confession  of  sin  by  a 
large  assembly.  Differences  of  social  position  and  of  personal 
attainment  seem  to  be  lost  sight  of  when  peer  and  peasant,  saint 
and  sinner,  kneel  side  by  side  and  repeat  together,  "  We  have 
erred  and  strayed  from  Thy  ways  like  lost  sheep  ".  The  spirits 
of  good  people  are  touched  to  some  of  their  finer  issues  when 
"  the  Lord,  gracious  and  full  of  compassion,"  bends  over  the  con- 
gregation of  penitents.  But  a  "  General  Confession  "  cannot 
possibly  satisfy  the  requirements  of  a  spiritual  religion.  A  sad 
experience  declares  that  such  a  united  act  may  cover  up  much 
unreality.  The  acknowledgment  that  we  are  "miserable 
ofienders"  is  made  with  mental  reservations.  Nobody  else  is 
expected  to  believe  it  about  the  man  who  says  it.  The  tempter 
whispers  into  the  ear  of  the  worshipper  that  it  is  the  other 
members  of  the  congregation  who  are  meant  chiefly  by  the 
offenders  against  God's  holy  laws.  We  are  well-nigh  guilty  of  a 
presumptuous  idea  that  the  confession  is  a  vicarious  act  on  our 
part,  in  which  we  encourage  our  neighbours  to  acknowledge  their 
faults  by  assuming  for  the  moment  that  we  may  be  faulty  too ; 
we  intend  to  put  aside  the  assumption  directly  we  rise  from  our 
knees,  and  we  nourish  the  pious  hope  that  our  neighbours  will 
hereafter  live  a  godly,  righteous,  and  sober  life.  The  presence  of 
other  people  diliuses  responsibility.  The  cloud  of  transgression 
thins  out  in  order  to  cover  everybody,  and  easy  souls  get  the  im- 
pression that  their  heads  reach  above  the  cloud  altogether,  into 
the  sunshine.  Therefore  a  general  confession  must  be  comple- 
mented by  a  particular  confession,  in  which  each  individual  soul 
shall  come  face  to  face  with  God.^ 

IF  The  easiest  place  for  a  criminal  to  lose  himself  in  is  a 
crowd.  The  fugitive  from  justice  rarely  flees  to  the  solitude  of 
the  countryside,  but  buries  himself  in  the  heart  of  some  great  city. 
It  is  easier  to  escape  detection  in  the  midst  of  his  fellow-men  than 
in  the  lonely  recesses  of  the  forest  or  the  hills.  Many  a  criminal 
has  been  lost  to  justice  in  the  teeming  populace  of  the  metropolis. 
Do  we  not  carry  something  of  this  thought,  something  of  the 
hope  that  our  individual  guilt  will  remain  undetected  in  the 
crowd,  into  our  dealings  with  God  ?  Do  we  not  sometimes  lose 
the  sense  of  our  personal  responsibility  when  we  join  in  our 
general  confession,  "  We  have  erred  and  strayed  like  lost  sheep. 
.  .  .  There  is  no  health  m  us''  ?  It  is  easy,  for  a  time  at  least, 
to  bury  ourselves  in  such  a  crowd  as  that.  But  oh !  if  we  are 
ever  to  taste  the  sweetness  of  Divine  pardon,  if  we  are  ever  to 

^  J.  £.  Roberts,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions,  54. 


CONFESSION  73 

thrill  with  joy  at  the  gracious  assurance,  "  Thy  sins,  which  are 
many,  are  all  forgiven,"  we  must  come  out  of  that  crowd  and  cast 
ourselves  individually  in  the  dust  before  Him.  "  I  will  confess 
mine  iniquity  unto  the  Lord,"  cried  David,  in  all  the  terrible 
isolation  of  his  conscious  guilt ;  and  then  he  found  the  blessing — 
"Thou  forgavest  the  iniquity  of  my  sin".  "God  be  merciful  to 
me  the  sinner,"  sobbed  the  poor  publican,  as  he  beat  upon  his 
breast  in  the  agony  of  his  personal  grief ;  and  when  he  came  to 
that  point  of  self-condemnation,  he  too  found  the  blessing — "  He 
went  down  to  his  house  justified  ".  The  prodigal,  burying  his  face 
in  his  father's  bosom,  cried,  "  Father,  I  have  sinned,"  and  then 
too  the  blessing  was  his — "  This  my  son  was  dead,  and  is  alive 
again  ;  he  was  lost,  and  is  found  ".^ 

IF  There  were  differences  among  the  doctors  of  the  Talmud  as 
to  the  propriety  of  manifold  and  detailed  confessions.  Thus 
Rabbi  Judah  ben  Baba  held  that  it  was  not  enough  to  make  a 
general  confession,  and  he  cited  the  example  of  Moses  who  prayed, 
"  Alas,  this  people  have  sinned  a  great  sin — they  have  made 
themselves  a  golden  calf".  Another  thought  that  the  essence  of 
all  was  contained  in  the  words,  "  Verily  we  have  sinned  ".  An- 
other, again,  found  fault  with  the  enumeration  of  our  sins  at  all. 
' '  To  my  thinking  it  is  a  sign  of  effrontery  in  a  person  to  detail 
all  his  offences  "  (Sotah,  76).  But  in  the  long  run  the  objection 
was  not  held  to  be  valid,  and  rightly  so,  for,  after  all,  the 
effrontery  lies  in  the  committing  of  sins  not  in  admitting  them. 
Still  the  older  forms  of  the  Alphabetical  Confession  were  much 
simpler  and  more  succinct  than  ours.  But  they  included  a  confes- 
sion of  "  Sins  done  under  compulsion,  or  of  our  own  free  will ;  in 
error  or  with  deliberation;  in  secret  or  in  public;  consciously 
or  unconsciously" — categories  comprehensive  enough.^ 

IF  In  some  of  the  older  devotional  books  of  the  synagogue 
there  is  found,  at  points  where  a  general  confession  has  been 
made,  a  blank  space  introduced  by  "and  in  particular,"  "We 
have  sinned  in  this  and  that  respect,  and  especially  " — in  what, 
each  has  then  to  supply.^ 

Stand  still,  my  soul,  in  the  silent  dark, 

I  would  question  thee, 
Alone  in  the  shadow  drear  and  stark, 

With  God  and  me  ! 


^  G.  A.  Sowter,  Trial  and  Triumph,  40. 

2  S.  Singer,  Sermons  and  Memoir,  72.        » i})id.  73. 


74      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

What !  silent  all !  art  sad  of  cheer  ? 

Art  fearful  now  ? 
When  God  seemed  far  and  men  were  near, 

How  brave  wert  thou  ! 

Aha  !  thou  tremblest ! — Well  I  see 

Thou'rt  craven  grown. 
Is  it  so  hard  with  God  and  me 

To  stand  alone  ? 

Ah  !  soul  of  mine,  so  brave  and  wise 

In  the  life-storm  loud, 
Fronting  so  calmly  all  human  eyes 

In  the  sunlit  crowd  ! 

Now  standing  apart  with  God  and  me, 

Thou  art  weakness  all, 
Gazing  vainly  after  the  things  to  be 

Through  Death's  dread  wall. 

1.  One  reason  why  a  general  confession  cannot  suffice  is  that 
it  is  too  "general".  It  does  not  particularize  our  sins  enough. 
So  many  needle-points  are  packed  together  that  there  is  a  smooth 
surface  rather  than  a  series  of  pricks.  The  sword  does  not  get 
in  through  the  joints  of  our  harnesa  Something  much  more 
searching  is  needed  than  a  general  confession  if  we  are  to  be 
cleansed  from  all  our  sins  and  to  serve  God  with  a  quiet  mind. 
We  are  tied  and  bound  with  the  chain  of  our  sins;  and  if  the 
pitifulness  of  God's  great  mercy  is  to  loose  us,  the  links  in  the 
chain  must  be  isolated  and  snapped  one  by  one.  In  our  private 
prayers  we  may  offer  that  marvellous  petition,  "Search  me,  O 
God,  and  know  my  heart :  try  me,  and  know  my  thoughts  :  and 
see  if  there  be  any  wicked  way  in  me,  and  lead  me  in  the  way 
everlasting  ".  The  candle  of  the  Lord  can  search  a  soul  best  when 
it  is  in  its  inner  chamber  and  the  door  is  shut.  Then  sins  are 
discovered  whose  existence  was  not  suspected  in  the  general 
assembly. 

IT  I  was  crossing  a  golf  course  one  day,  and  was  amazed  to 
see  one  of  the  greens  covered  with  large  worms.  Some  worm 
casts  had  been  noticed  on  that  green  before,  and  there  was  a  vague 
idea  that  a  roller  needed  to  be  used.  But  now  a  particular  liquid 
had  been  poured  over  the  green,  which  compelled  all  the  worms 
to  wriggle  out  into  the  light.     Then  it  was  obvious  to  all  that 


CONFESSION  75 

the  green  was  swarming  with  them  just  below  the  surface.  In 
our  private  prayers  we  allow  the  Divine  Gardener  to  pour  over 
our  lives  the  liquid  that  discovers  secret  sins.  Very  often  the 
result  is  amazing.  Instead  of  being  content  with  a  General 
Absolution  following  a  General  Confession,  like  a  garden  roller 
over  the  casts,  we  are  on  our  knees  before  God  crying  "  Who  can 
understand  his  errors?  Cleanse  thou  me  from  secret  faults." 
*'  Mine  iniquities  have  taken  hold  upon  me,  so  that  I  am  not  able 
to  look  up  ;  they  are  more  than  the  hairs  of  mine  head :  therefore 
my  heart  faileth  me.  Be  pleased,  O  Lord,  to  deliver  me :  O 
Lord,  make  haste  to  help  me."  ^ 

IF  A  wise  old  writer  says,  "  A  child  of  God  will  confess  sin  in 
particular ;  an  unsound  Christian  will  confess  sin  by  wholesale ; 
he  will  acknowledge  he  is  a  sinner  in  general;  whereas  David 
doth,  as  it  were,  point  with  his  finger  to  the  sore :  '  I  have  done 
this  evil '  (Ps.  li.  4) ;  he  doth  not  say,  '  I  have  done  evil,'  but '  this 
evil '.     He  points  to  his  blood-guiltiness."  "^ 

2.  But  not  only  must  there  be  self-examination,  so  that  we 
may  discover  our  sins,  there  must  also  be  confession  of  them. 
Some  honest  self-examination  there  must  be  if  our  confession  is 
to  nurture  our  Christian  life.  But  how  can  God  forgive  our  sins 
unless  we  confess  them  ?  The  confession  of  sin  is  an  essential 
part  of  all  true  repentance.  The  prodigal  must  not  only  experi- 
ence in  the  "far  country"  the  sense  of  grief  and  shame  at  his 
folly,  and  find  his  way  back  in  sorrow  to  the  father  s  house,  but 
the  pent-up  emotions  of  his  heart  must  find  an  outlet  in  full  and 
frank  confession  before  he  could  taste  the  sweetness  of  forgiving 
love.  "  Father,"  he  cried,  "  I  have  sinned  against  heaven,  and 
before  thee,  and  am  no  more  worthy  to  be  called  thy  son."  And 
then  it  was  that  his  rags  were  removed  and  the  best  robe  in  the 
father's  house  was  put  on  him  instead ;  then  it  was  that  the  ring 
was  slipped  upon  his  finger  as  an  emblem  of  love  that  both  for- 
gave and  forgot,  and  he  was  taken  back  to  the  father's  heart  and 
home  again. 

This  confession  must  be  frank  and  full  and  unreserved.  No 
extenuating  plea  must  mar  its  utterance.  No  excuse  for  sin 
must  mingle  with  the  breath  of  sin's  confession.  Nothing  must 
be  palliated  or  softened  down.     We  are  prone  to  make  excuses 

^  J.  E.  Roberts,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions,  54. 
2  D.  M.  Mclntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  102. 


^6      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

for  our  sins  even  on  our  knees.  All  those  pleas  which  we  are 
so  familiar  with  and  which  we  utter  with  such  facility,  either 
to  shift  the  guilt  to  another  or  to  excuse  it  in  ourselves — all 
those  pleas  of  ignorance,  or  compulsion,  or  strong  and  sudden 
temptation,  or  natural  infirmity,  or  good  intention — all  those 
"  buts "  which  fall  so  easily  from  our  lips  in  our  dealings  with 
God  only  choke  the  channel  of  Divine  forgiveness  and  rob  us 
of  the  blessing  we  stand  in  need  of.  It  is  only  "if  we  confess 
our  sins,"  not  if  we  excuse  and  mitigate  our  sins,  that  He  is 
faithful  and  just  to  pardon  them  every  one. 

Our  confession  must  also  be  humble  and  contrite.  No  shred 
of  self-complacency  lingered  in  the  prodigal's  heart  as  he  turned 
his  steps  homeward.  The  clothing  of  his  spirit  was  as  rent  and 
torn  as  the  tatters  which  hung  about  his  body.  He  was  utterly 
humbled,  sincerely  contrite,  ready  to  take  the  lowest  place  in 
the  old  home  now.  "  Make  me  as  one  of  thy  hired  servants.'* 
Lower  even  than  a  slave  stood  the  hireling,  the  mere  day 
labourer ;  no  legal  rights  in  the  family  safeguarded  and  amelior- 
ated his  position,  such  as  mitigated  the  position  of  the  slave. 
Yet  such  a  status  as  that  was  all  the  prodigal  could  dare  to 
hope  for  in  the  depths  of  his  self-reproach  and  self-abasement. 
He  must  have  been  utterly  heart-broken  to  have  come  down  to 
that. 

IT  We  shall  do  well  to  take  heed  to  the  urgent  pleas  of  Thomas 
k  Kempis:  "Examine  diligently  thy  conscience,  and  to  the 
utmost  of  thy  power  purify  and  make  it  clear,  with  true  contri- 
tion and  humble  confession ;  so  as  there  may  be  nothing  in  thee 
that  may  weigh  heavy  upon  thee,  or  that  may  breed  in  thee  re- 
morse of  conscience,  or  hinder  thy  free  access  to  the  throne  of 
grace.  Think  with  displeasure  of  all  thy  sins  in  general,  and 
more  particularly  bewail  and  lament  thy  daily  transgressions. 
And  if  thou  hast  time,  confess  unto  God,  in  the  secret  of  thine 
heart,  all  the  wretchedness  of  thy  disordered  passions." 

II. 

Hopeful. 

It  is  very  necessary  that  in  self-examination  we  should  search 
with  God  the  inmost  secrets  of  the  heart  and  bow  in  uttermost 
humility  before  Him.     Yet  it  sometimes  happens  that,  in  the  ap- 


CONFESSION  77 

prehension  of  thinking  too  favourably  of  ourselves,  we  fall  into 
the  opposite  extreme.  We  disclaim  all  good,  every  better  quality. 
Then,  in  the  midst  of  this  self-abasement,  a  voice  within  whispers, 
"  How  very  humble  thou  art !  "  and  thus  pride  strikes  its  roots, 
though  quite  secretly,  in  the  soul.  God  is  the  God  of  truth. 
Therefore  we  cannot  please  Him  by  making  ourselves  worse  than 
we  are.  We  are  to  pass  neither  too  gentle  nor  too  harsh  a  judgment 
on  ourselves,  but  one  in  harmony  with  truth.  If  in  our  own 
thoughts  we  disparage  ourselves  beneath  our  real  worth,  this 
inward  untruth  is  again  rebuked  by  the  same  voice  that  whispered 
in  our  ear  of  our  marked  humility.  No  doubt  we  are  always  to 
feel  ourselves  to  be  poor  sinners ;  but  if  we  are  true  Christians, 
we  cannot  forget  that  we  are  God's  children.  No  doubt  we 
should  sorrow  that  the  power  of  sin  is  not  yet  utterly  broken  in 
us,  that  we  are  compelled,  therefore,  to  stand  perpetually  on  our 
guard ;  but  it  were  ingratitude  not  to  rejoice  in  God's  grace, 
which,  provided  our  faith  is  a  living  one,  we  know  not  merely  as 
pardoning  mercy,  but  also  as  the  living  energy  by  which  our 
inner  nature  is  being  more  and  more  renewed.  We  are  by  no 
means  so  good  that,  in  order  to  remain  humble,  we  are  absolutely 
compelled  to  regard  ourselves  as  worse  than  we  are.  Even  if  we 
were  so  advanced,  is  not  all  self-complacency  dashed  to  the  ground 
by  the  single  thought :  "  What  had  become  of  thee  if  thou  hadst 
had  no  Saviour  ?  " 

H  There  are  two  dangers,  quite  opposite  in  character,  which  are 
liable  to  confront  us  as  we  engage  in  the  practice  of  Confession. 
On  the  one  hand,  there  is  the  danger  to  regard  confession  as  a 
mere  matter  of  routine,  and,  in  consequence,  to  think  lightly  of 
sin  ;  on  the  other  hand,  we  may  be  tempted  to  indulge  in  morbid 
self-examination.  In  both  cases  the  great  truth  has  been  forgot- 
ten that  confession  is  of  no  use  unless  we  are  ready  to  forsake 
the  sins  we  own.  If  we  are  content  to  go  on  day  after  day,  as 
many  do,  acknowledging  the  same  sins  without  breaking  loose 
from  them,  conscience  will  be  dulled,  and  we  shall  become  too 
familiar  with  sin  to  see  its  hatefulness  in  God's  sight.  If  on  the 
other  hand  we  are  forever  bemoaning  our  besetting  sins  and 
allowing  ourselves  daily  to  sink  lower  under  the  burden  of  them, 
we  are  surely  dishonouring  God,  who  is  bidding  us  rise  up  from  our 
faces  to  put  away  the  accursed  thing  from  amongst  us.  If,  how- 
ever, we  forsake  the  sin  which  we  confess,  and  daily  prove  the 
power  of  God  to  deliver  us,  and  believe  His  word,  "  Sin  shall  not 


72>      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

have  dominion  over  you,"  confession  may  be  the  path  to  untold 
blessing.^ 

IF  It  is  of  the  first  importance  that  in  all  the  exercises  of  the 
secret  chamber  we  should  yield  ourselves  to  the  blessed  influences 
of  the  Comforter,  by  whom  alone  we  are  enabled  to  pray  with 
acceptance.  An  important  caution  in  regard  to  this  has  been 
noted  by  Ralph  Erskine.  In  his  diary  he  writes,  under  the  date, 
Jan.  23,  1733  :  "This  morning  ...  I  was  quickened  in  prayer, 
and  strengthened  to  hope  in  the  Lord.  At  the  beginning  of  my 
prayer  I  discerned  a  lively  frame  in  asserting  a  God  in  Christ  to 
be  the  fountain  of  my  life,  the  strength  of  my  life,  the  joy  of  my 
life ;  and  that  I  had  no  life  that  deserved  that  name,  unless  He 
Himself  were  my  life.  But  here,  checking  myself  with  reflec- 
tions upon  my  own  sinfulness,  vileness,  and  corruption,  I  began 
to  acknowledge  my  wickedness  ;  but  for  the  time  the  sweetness 
of  frame  failed  me,  and  wore  off*.  Whence,  I  think,  I  may  gather 
this  lesson,  that  no  sweet  influence  of  the  Spirit  ought  to  be 
checked  upon  pretence  of  getting  a  frame  better  founded  upon 
humiliation  ;  otherwise  the  Lord  may  be  provoked  to  withdraw.'* 
When  Thomas  Boston  found  himself  in  danger  of  giving  way  to 
vain-glory,  he  took  a  look  at  his  black  feet.  We  may  well  do 
the  same,  but  never  so  as  to  lose  our  assurance  of  sonship,  or  our 
sense  of  the  preciousness  of  Christ.  As  Rutherford  reminds  us, 
"  There  is  no  law-music  in  heaven :  there  all  their  song  is,  '  Worthy 
is  the  Lamb '."    And  the  blood  of  ransom  has  atoned  for  all  sin.^ 

III. 

Heartfelt. 

There  must  be  reality  in  our  confessions.  In  more  ways  than 
one  we  seek  to  escape  this  demand,  for  a  true  heartfelt  confession 
is  by  no  means  easy  to  make. 

1.  We  probably  never  pray,  without  making  confession  of  sin. 
Do  we  mean  it  ?  There  is  a  natural  reluctance  to  that  detection 
which  all  real  confession  presupposes.  It  is  this  reluctance 
which,  in  the  last  analysis,  we  find  keeps  men  back  from  Christ. 
"  This  is  the  judgment,"  says  St.  John,  "  that  the  light  is  come 
into  the  world,  and  men  loved  the  darkness  rather  than  the  light ; 
for  their  works  were  evil.     For  every  one  that  doeth  ill  hateth 

^  Charles  F.  Harford-Battersby,  Daily  :  A  Help  to  Private  Prayer,  21. 
3  D.  M.  Mclntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  105. 


CONFESSION  79 

the  light,  and  cometh  not  to  the  light,  lest  his  works  should  be 
reproved."  Now  this  natural  reluctance  is  not  for  ever  over- 
come by  the  initial  experience  of  conviction  and  confession.  It 
remains  with  us,  and  may  even  acquire  fresh  strength.  This  re- 
luctance may  easily  be  stronger  at  a  later  stage  of  a  Christian's 
life  than  it  was  when  he  first  acknowledged  to  God  his  trans- 
gressions. First  confessions  are  not  always  the  hardest  to  make. 
If  old  sins  treacherously  recur  ;  if  we  find  that  we  have  outgrown 
some  sins  by  the  mere  lapse  of  time,  only  to  develop  new  sins, 
less  passionate,  perhaps,  but  likely  to  be  more  persistent ;  if  on 
a  review  we  find  that  we  have  gone  backward  rather  than  for- 
ward, who  of  us  would  not  feel  humiliated  ?  Who  of  us  does  not 
shrink  from  acknowledging  such  things  even  to  himself  ?  Who 
of  us  is  not  aware  of  a  reluctance  to  come  to  the  light,  an  un- 
willingness to  admit  what  we  suspect,  and  what  an  unflinching 
scrutiny  would  put  beyond  suspicion  ?  Who  of  us  that  attends 
to  his  inner  life  does  not  know  how  the  very  pang  of  conscience 
which  attends  some  sin  into  which  he  may  have  been  surprised 
starts  into  action  an  exculpatory  train  of  thought,  by  which  the 
sin  is  relieved  of  its  grievousness  ?  An  oyster  will  so  cover  an 
irritating  grain  of  sand  that  it  becomes  a  pearl.  And  a  tolerated 
sin  may  be  so  enveloped  in  palliations,  that,  if  we  do  not  admire 
it,  we  are  at  least  no  longer  pained  by  it. 

IF  A  somewhat  amazing  fact  in  the  strange  and  contradictory 
character  of  Samuel  Pepys  is  the  constant  element  of  subtlety 
which  blends  with  so  much  frankness.  He  wants  to  do  wrong 
in  many  different  ways,  but  he  wants  still  more  to  do  it  with 
propriety,  and  to  have  some  sort  of  plausible  excuse  which  will 
explain  it  in  a  respectable  light.  Nor  is  it  only  other  people 
whom  he  is  bent  on  deceiving.  Were  that  all,  we  should  have  a 
very  simple  type  of  hypocritical  scoundrel,  which  would  be  as 
different  as  possible  from  the  extraordinary  Pepys.  There  is  a 
sense  of  propriety  in  him,  and  a  conscience  of  obeying  the  letter 
of  the  law  and  keeping  up  appearances  even  in  his  own  eyes. 
If  he  can  persuade  himself  that  he  has  done  that,  all  things  are 
open  to  him.  He  will  receive  a  bribe,  but  it  must  be  given  in 
such  a  way  that  he  can  satisfy  his  conscience  with  ingenious 
words.  The  envelope  has  coins  in  it,  but  then  he  opens  it  behind 
his  back  and  the  coins  fall  out  upon  the  floor.  He  has  only 
picked  them  up  when  he  found  them  there,  and  can  defy  the 
world  to  accuse  him  of  having  received  any  coins  in  the  envelope 


8o      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

It  is  a  curious  question  what  idea  of  God  can  be  entertained  by 
a  man  who  plays  tricks  with  himself  in  this  fashion.  Of  Pepys 
certainly  it  cannot  be  said  that  God  "is  not  in  all  his  thoughts," 
for  the  name  and  the  remembrance  are  constantly  recurring.  Yet 
God  seems  to  occupy  a  quite  hermetically  sealed  compartment  of 
the  universe  ;  for  His  servant  in  London  shamelessly  goes  on  with 
the  game  he  is  playing,  and  appears  to  take  a  pride  in  the  very 
conscience  he  systematically  hoodwinks. ^ 

2.  Again,  in  many  instances,  self -accusation  is  not  the  outcome 
of  a  genuine  self -dissatisfaction.  It  is  often  but  a  form  of  morbid 
self-indulgence.  "  There  is  a  luxury  in  self -dispraise,"  says  one 
of  our  poets.  There  are  people  who  take  a  strange  pleasure  in 
disparaging  themselves,  in  charging  themselves  with  all  kinds  of 
wickedness,  railing  against  themselves  as  miserable  sinners ;  but 
all  their  lamentations  about  their  weak  and  sinful  hves  are  not 
the  least  guarantee  of  a  change,  or  as  much  as  an  effort,  for  the 
better.  There  is  even  a  suspicion  of  hypocrisy,  of  posing,  in 
many  confessions  of  this  insincere  kind.  Some  of  the  Italian 
writers,  both  Jews  and  others,  accuse  themselves  of  sins  they 
never  committed,  because  those  sins  were  regarded  as  fashionable 
marks  of  the  man-about-town.  The  law  does  not  readily  con- 
demn a  man  on  his  own  unsupported  confession.  Corroborative 
evidence  is  demanded  before  a  conviction  is  entered.  Men  play 
with  the  founts  of  their  spiritual  being. 

IT  Vanity,  unequivocal  vanity,  sometimes  finds  vent  in  self- 
depreciation.  One  mode  of  this  is  when  we  affectedly  cry  our- 
selves down  with  a  hope — more  or  less  concealed  even  from 
ourselves — that  others  will  protest  and  set  us  up  again.  Another 
mode  is  when  we  cry  ourselves  down  as  to  particular  faculties  of 
a  secondary  order,  in  order  by  implication  to  set  up  some  faculty 
of  higher  rank.^ 

IV. 

Desire  for  Holiness. 

The  true  prayer  for  forgiveness  implies  the  germ  of  a  real 
desire  to  be  delivered  not  only  from  the  penalty  of  sin,  but  from 
sin  in  itself,  from  its  disorder,  its  bondage,  its  pollution.     Apart 

^  J.  Kelman,  Among  Famous  Books,  187. 

^Letters  on  Chu/rch  and  Religion  of  W.  E.  Gladstone,  ii.  161. 


CONFESSION  8i 

from  that  desire,  the  prayer  could  receive  no  answer  such  as  would 
be  consistent  with  the  holy  love  of  God,  because  he  who  offered  it 
would  not  be  in  a  moral  condition  which  is  forgivable.  It  is  a 
desire  due  to  the  action  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  He  convicts  not  only 
of  sin  by  the  revelation  of  its  nature  and  effects ;  He  convicts  also 
of  righteousness  by  the  revelation  of  the  character  of  the  Man 
Christ  Jesus,  and  of  our  supernatural  capacities  through  incor- 
poration with  His  new  and  sacred  humanity. 

Here  is  the  imperishable  power  of  the  Miserere  lifted  by  its 
inspiration  beyond  the  circumstances  which  were  the  immediate 
cause  of  its  composition.  There  is  in  that  psalm  not  only  the  cry 
for  pardon,  but  the  desire  for  holiness ;  there  is  not  only  the  vision 
of  mercy,  but  the  vision  of  restoration  ;  there  is  not  only  the  hope 
of  reunion  with  the  outward  worship  of  the  Church,  but  in  that 
worship  the  penitential  joy  of  the  inward  offering  of  the  broken 
and  contrite  heart.  In  the  Christian  use  of  the  same  psalm  we 
learn  that  in  the  act  of  Divine  forgiveness  there  is  no  element 
of  moral  laxity.  The  pardon  meets  the  desire  for  holiness,  how- 
ever rudimentary  that  desire  may  be,  and  it  makes  actual  holi- 
ness a  possibility.  In  his  confession  and  in  his  prayer,  the 
penitent  desires  an  absolution  which  shall  be  not  only  an  authori- 
tative message  of  peace  but  also  a  gracious  means  of  deliverance 
from  sin's  power. 

If  Our  prayer  must  therefore  be,  "  Lord,  take  my  heart  and 
cleanse  it,  for  I  cannot  cleanse  it  myself ;  keep  it  Thyself,  for  I 
cannot  keep  it  for  Thee  ".  And  He  will  answer  the  prayer.  He 
will  bring  these  poor  sinful  hearts  of  ours  into  such  close  fellow- 
ship with  Himself  that  His  holy  nature  will  be  transfused  into 
ours ;  moment  by  moment  we  shall  become  larger  sharers  in  His 
victory  and  His  peace :  and  the  hearts  in  which  He  dwells  will 
become  living  temples,  full  of  "  thanksgiving  and  the  voice  of 
melody  ".^ 

V. 

Endeavour  After  New  Obedience. 

And  as  confession  is  made  in  sincerity  and  in  truth,  the  con- 
ception of  the  life  which  we  ought  to  live  grows  clearer.  As 
satisfaction  with  self  departs  in  the  prayer  for  forgiveness,  and 

1  G.  H.  Knight,  In  the  Secret  of  His  Presence,  30. 
6 


82       CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

we  rejoice  to  realize  that  God  is  once  more  occupying  the  throne 
of  the  heart,  so  the  ideal  of  the  life  of  those  who  would  '*  ascend 
into  the  hill  of  the  Lord,"  and  "stand  in  his  holy  place,"  or  be 
hidden  "  in  the  covert  of  his  presence,"  is  ever  rising.  We  may 
go  through  a  long  list  of  the  questions  for  self-examination  pro- 
vided in  many  devotional  manuals,  and  few  of  these,  perhaps,  may 
touch  us.  But  then  there  are  the  things  left  undone  which  we 
ought  to  have  done,  as  well  as  the  things  done  which  we  ought 
not  to  have  done.  There  are  failures,  neglects,  omissions,  in 
regard  to  God,  our  neighbour,  and  ourselves  which  constitute  a 
"  burden  that  is  intolerable ".  And  there  is  also  the  standard 
which  we  ought  in  our  consciences  to  recognize  of  the  life  and 
character  and  conduct  of  the  children  of  the  Father,  as  it  is  por- 
trayed by  our  Lord  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  and  in  many  a 
parable,  or  by  St.  Paul  in  the  letter  to  Ephesus,  or  by  St.  John 
in  his  First  Epistle,  developing  the  sense  of  the  new  command- 
ment given  at  the  institution  of  the  Sacrament  of  unity  by  his 
Master,  "  That  ye  love  one  another ;  even  as  I  have  loved  you, 
that  ye  also  love  one  another,'*  when  He  made  that  unity  in  love 
the  evidence  of  discipleship. 

IF  I  do  not  think  that  we  are  called  upon  to  confess  our  sins  to 
men,  except  in  certain  cases,  or  when  we  have  individually  wronged 
them ;  but  we  are  called  upon  to  acknowledge  them  before  God — 
"  O  Lord,  against  thee,  thee  only,  have  I  sinned  ".  Nor  should 
we  tease  ourselves  about  the  past,  which  cannot  be  undone.  But 
we  should  set  before  ourselves,  and  fix  indelibly  in  our  minds,  that 
these  things  were  wrong,  offences  against  the  laws  of  God,  and 
some  of  them  perhaps  disgraceful  in  the  opinion  of  men.  One 
use  of  prayer  is  to  maintain  in  us  a  higher  standard,  and  prevent 
our  principles  insensibly  sinking  to  our  practice,  or  to  the  practice 
of  the  world  around  us.  When  a  man  listens  to  the  voice  of  the 
tempter  within  him,  he  is  inclined  to  do  as  others  do,  not  to  resist 
when  the  temptation  seems  great.  But  when  he  looks  into  the 
law  of  God  and  hears  the  words  of  Christ,  his  natural  sense  of 
right  and  wrong  is  restored  to  him,  and  he  becomes  elevated, 
purified,  sanctified.^ 

IT  In  the  secret  of  His  presence  we  can  lay  bare  to  Him,  with- 
out fear,  the  inmost  secrets  of  the  soul.  This  is  what  we  cannot 
do  even  to  the  dearest  friend  on  earth.     It  is  what  we  sometimes 

^  6.  Jowett,  Semtoru  on  Faith  and  Doctrinet  259. 


CONFESSION  83 

dare  not^ido.  Our  lips  are  sealed  for  very  shame.  But  freely 
and  unrestrainedly  we  can  confide  our  most  secret  shames  and 
sadnesses  to  the  ear  of  our  listening  Lord.  It  is  this  that  makes 
the  prayer-chamber  a  place  of  such  infinite  relief  to  an  over- 
burdened spirit.^ 

^  G.  H.  Knight,  In  the  Secret  of  His  Presence,  67. 


V. 

Petition. 


Literature. 

Augustine,  St.,  Confessions  (tr.  Montgomery,  1910). 

Bowne,  B,  P.,  The  Essence  of  Religion  (1911). 

Cooke,  G.  A.,  The  Progress  of  Revelation  (1910). 

Diggle,  J.  W. ,  Sermons  for  Daily  Life  (1891). 

Douglas,  A.  F.,  Prayer  :  A  Practical  Treatise  (1901). 

Gore,  C,  Prayer  and  the  Lord's  Prayer  (1898). 

Hutton,  R.  E.,  The  Crown  of  Christ,  ii.  (1900). 

lUingworth,  J.  R.,  Christian  Character  (1904). 

Jones,  S.,  Now  and  Then  (1904). 

Kaftan,  J.,  Die  Christliche  Lehre  vom  Gebet  (1876). 

Lowry,  S.  C,  The  Problems  and  Practice  of  Prayer  (1912). 

McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 

Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

Matheson,  G.,  Thoughts  for  Life's  Journey  (1907). 

Miller,  J.  R.,  The  Glory  of  the  Commonplace  (1913). 

Morrison,  G.  H.,  The  Afterglow  of  God  (1911). 

Mortimer,  A.  G.,  Catholic  Faith  and  Practice  (1897). 

Robinson,  A.  W.,  The  Voice  of  Joy  and  Health  (1911). 

Robinson,  F.,  College  and  Ordination  Addresses  (1905). 

Saphir,  A.,  The  Hidden  Life  (1877). 

Strong,  A.  H.,  Miscellanies j  ii.  (1912). 

Thomas,  H.  A.,  in  Faith  and  Criticism  (1893). 

Townsend,  W.  J.,  As  a  King  Ready  to  the  Battle  (1904). 

Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 

Dictionary  of  the  Bible,  iv.  (1902)  38  (E.  R.  Bernard). 

Harvard  Theological  Review,  iv.  (1911),  489  (M.  W.  Calkins). 


86 


Petition. 

1.  The  Sermon  on  the   Mount  provides  us  with  the   precept, 
the  reasonableness,  the  character,  and  the  form  of  prayer. 

It  gives  us  the  precept :  "  Ask,  and  it  shall  be  given  you ". 
It  shows  us  the  reasonableness — for  "  What  man  is  there  of  you, 
whom  if  his  son  ask  bread,  will  he  give  him  a  stone  ?  or  if  he 
ask  a  fish,  will  he  give  him  a  serpent  ?  If  ye  then,  being  evil, 
know  how  to  give  good  gifts  unto  your  children,  how  much  more 
shall  your  Father  which  is  in  heaven  give  good  things  to  them 
that  ask  him  ? "  It  discovers  the  character  of  prayer  when  it 
bids  us  use  no  vain  repetitions,  remembering  that  God  knows  our 
needs  before  we  ask  Him.  And  it  provides  the  mould  or  type  or 
form  of  prayer  in  the  words  of  the  Lord's  Prayer. 

(1)  First,  we  have  the  precept.  Prayer  is  a  duty  of  the  Chris- 
tian life  enjoined  upon  us  all  by  our  Saviour  Himself,  and  there- 
fore to  neglect  prayer  is  to  break  one  of  the  commandments  of 
God.  It  is  well  to  feel  the  pressure  of  this  command  and  to  experi- 
ence once  again  the  freshness  of  its  force.  And  the  impression  is 
deepened  when  we  see  how  our  Saviour  supported  His  teaching 
by  His  example.  Nor  was  it  merely  for  the  sake  of  example 
that  He  prayed ;  prayer  was  in  some  mysterious  sense  a  neces- 
sary part  of  His  ministerial  life.  In  the  moment  of  His  baptism 
He  prayed,  and  a  voice  was  heard  from  heaven,  "  This  is  my 
beloved  Son,  in  whom  I  am  well  pleased  ".  He  prayed  on  the 
mount,  and  His  face  and  whole  form  was  transfigured;  to  St. 
Peter  He  said,  "  I  have  prayed  for  thee,  that  thy  faith  fail  not "  ; 
in  the  garden  of  the  agony  He  prayed  for  Himself,  and  on  the 
cross  He  prayed  for  His  enemies :  "  Father,  forgive  them ;  for 
they  know  not  what  they  do  ".  Sometimes,  too,  He  would  pray 
all  night  in  view  of  some  coming  event,  as  before  His  choice  of 
the  Twelve;  and  He  enjoins  upon  all  of  us  the  double  attitude  of 
watchfulness  and  prayer  as  a  necessary  prescription  for  the  snares 
and  temptations  of  the  world. 

87 


88       CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

(2)  Now  prayer,  as  thus  set  before  us,  is  no  mere  vague  and 
general  exercise,  but  individuals  as  well  as  communities  are 
mentioned  by  name,  and  many  and  various  requests  are  made 
both  for  self  and  for  others.  Prayer  is  therefore  a  reasonable 
exercise  as  well  as  an  attitude  of  the  soul ;  for  if  asking  be  the 
primary  meaning  of  prayer,  is  not  our  everyday  life  full  of  it  ? 
Power  comes  from  God  and  is  variously  distributed  to  men  ;  and, 
although  much  of  it  is  ours  without  our  asking,  the  general  rule 
is  that  we  must  ask  for  things  if  we  would  have  them  ;  they  are 
not  ours  merely  because  they  lie  about  us ;  we  have  to  bestir 
ourselves  and  let  our  requests  be  made  known  to  others  in  order 
that  we  may  obtain  blessings  for  ourselves. 

(3)  Next,  there  is  the  character  of  prayer.  Our  Lord  reminds 
us  that  if  prayer  to  God  is  but  an  extension  of  that  principle 
which  leads  us  to  beg  favours  from  our  fellow-men,  nevertheless 
we  have  to  remember  that  He  is  in  heaven,  whereas  we  are  on 
earth,  that  He  knows  our  necessities  before  we  ask,  and  that  we 
must  therefore  avoid  vain  repetitions,  inasmuch  as  we  shall  not 
be  heard  for  our  much  speaking.  It  is  true  that  prayer  is  not 
merely  asking,  but  also  any  form  of  communion  with  God; 
nevertheless  its  primary  meaning  is  petition,  and  we  do  not  know 
how  to  pray  until  we  have  learnt  how  to  ask. 

(4)  Lastly,  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  gives  us  the  right  type 
or  form  of  prayer.  For  the  Lord's  Prayer  is  not  merely  one 
among  a  number  of  prayers,  but  the  representative  prayer  of  all ; 
and  as  in  matters  of  taste  a  standa'rd  or  idea  of  the  subject  must 
first  be  set  up  in  our  minds,  all  our  efforts  being  made  as  far  as 
possible  to  conform  to  it,  so  is  it  also  with  prayer.  Thus  we 
ought  to  recognize  in  the  "  Our  Father,"  over  and  beyond  the 
special  beauty  and  grandeur  that  attach  to  it  as  proceeding  from 
our  Saviour's  own  lips,  a  framework  for  all  prayers  whatsoever, 
or,  to  change  the  figure,  the  normal  lines  upon  which  all  our 
prayers  of  whatever  kind  should  be  made  to  run.  And,  first,  we 
are  directed  to  a  Person  and  a  Place  outside  us  :  to  our  Father, 
and  to  Heaven,  where  He  has  His  throne  ;  suggesting  to  us  how 
a  picture  in  the  mind  at  the  outset  will  provide  a  help  to  our 
prayers  throughout,  while  the  address  to  God  as  "  Our  Father  " 
proclaims  the  unity  of  the  Church,  and  that  exhibition  of  the 
family  life  which  it  is  intended  to  portray.     Next,  we  prepare  the 


PETITION  89 

way  for  our  petitions  by  submitting  beforehand  to  God's  will. 
"  Thy  kingdom  come  " — may  Thy  rule  gradually  obtain  every- 
where, may  the  visible  borders  of  Thy  Church  be  extended,  and 
every  thought  be  brought  at  length  into  captivity  to  Christ ; 
"  that  Christ  may  dwell  in  "  our  hearts  "  by  faith,"  that  "  being 
rooted  and  grounded  in  love,"  we  may  "  be  able  to  comprehend 
with  all  saints  what  is  the  breadth,  and  length,  and  depth,  and 
height "  ;  that  is,  that  the  will  of  God  may  be  done  on  earth  as  it 
is  done  in  heaven  ;  not  as  though  our  prayer  were  put  forth 
as  an  attempt  to  alter  God's  will,  but  on  the  contrary  in  direct 
obedience  to  His  command,  prayer  itself  being  according  to  that 
will  and  part  of  the  machinery  for  carrying  it  out. 

IT  After  this  our  Lord  showed  me  concerning  Prayer.  I  saw 
two  conditions  [needful]  in  them  that  pray,  according  to  that  I 
have  felt  in  myself. 

One  is,  they  will  not  pray  for  anything  that  may  be,  but 
that  thing  that  is  God's  will  and  His  worship. 

Another  is,  that  they  set  them  mightily  and  continually  to 
beseech  that  thing  that  is  His  will  and  His  worship. ^ 

The  dear  God  hears  and  pities  all ; 

He  knoweth  all  our  wants  ; 
And  what  we  blindly  ask  of  Him 

His  love  withholds  or  grants. 

And  so  I  sometimes  think  our  prayers 

Might  well  be  merged  in  one  ; 
And  nest  and  perch  and  hearth  and  church 

Repeat  "  Thy  will  be  done  ".'^ 

2.  The  most  obvious  fact  in  the  Lord's  Prayer,  when  regarded 
as  the  norm  of  all  prayer,  is  that  God  comes  first.  This  prayer, 
with  which  we  are  so  familiar  as  often  to  miss  its  significance,  is 
a  perpetual  reminder  of  this,  a  perpetual  safeguard  against  all 
unworthier  conceptions  of  prayer.  For  it  bids  us  think  first  of 
God  and  His  holiness,  of  the  spread  of  that  holiness  on  earth, 
of  His  heavenly  will  being  done.  Only  then  follow  personal 
petitions,  and  of  these  three  are  concerned  with  the  spiritual 
obstacles  which  separate  us  from  God  :  forgiveness  of  sin,  rescue 
from  temptation,  deliverance  from  evil.     One  only  is  devoted  to 

1  Lady  Julian,  Comfortable  Words  for  Christ's  Lovers,  96. 
'  Whittier,  The  Common  Qtiestion. 


90      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

our  temporal  welfare,  and  that  in  its  simplest  form,  **  Give  us 
bread  enough  for  to-day  ' '.  And  even  this,  of  course,  in  the  light 
of  Christ's  teaching,  passes  up  into  a  spiritual  significance,  and 
leads  our  thoughts  on  to  the  meat  which  is  to  do  God's  will, 
and  the  bread  that  came  down  from  heaven.  Thus  the  Lord's 
Prayer  teaches  us  to  pray,  in  the  deepest  sense  of  the  word,  for  it 
shows  us  the  true  order  and  importance  and  proportion  of  the 
objects  of  prayer  ;  and  to  live  it  out  is  to  live  in  union  with  God. 
Naturally  we  are  disposed  to  reverse  the  order.  Our  own 
personal  needs  are  so  present  and  pressing  that  these  are  ever 
ready  to  come  uppermost,  and  then  they  occupy  us  so  much  that 
the  time  which  ought  to  be  devoted  to  praise  and  thanksgiving 
is  often  wanting.  The  consequence  of  this  is  that  faith  is 
weakened,  and  prayer  becomes  so  purely  selfish  that  it  loses  its 
power  both  over  ourselves  and  over  God. 

IT  Some  good  people  never  go  outside  the  circle  of  self  in  their 
prayers.  Yet  the  last  place  in  the  world  where  we  should  be 
selfish  is  when  we  are  on  our  knees.  A  minister  made  a  strange 
request  of  a  parishioner — that  for  a  month  he  should  not  offer  a 
single  word  of  prayer  for  himself,  or  for  any  of  his  family,  nor 
bring  any  of  his  own  affairs  to  God.  "  What  then  shall  I  pray 
for  ? "  asked  the  friend.  "  Anything  that  is  in  your  heart,  only 
not  once  for  yourself."  When  the  good  man  came  to  his  first 
season  of  prayer  it  seemed  that  he  could  find  nothing  to  pray  for. 
He  would  begin  a  familiar  petition,  but  had  to  drop  it,  for  it  was 
something  for  himself.  It  was  a  serious  month  for  him,  but  he 
learned  his  lesson.  He  found  that  he  had  been  praying  only  for 
himself  and  his  own  household,  and  had  not  been  taking  the 
interests  of  any  others  to  God.  The  Lord's  Prayer  teaches  us  to 
pray  for  others  with  ourselves.  It  is  not,  "  Give  me  this  day  my 
daily  bread,"  but  "  Give  us  our  bread  to-day,"  leaving  out  no 
other  hungry  one.^ 

IF  My  brother,  take  heed  to  that  for  which  thou  pray  est ! — 
there  lies  the  difference  between  the  pious  and  the  impious  mind. 
It  is  not  thy  praying  that  makes  thee  good — not  even  thy 
sincerity  in  prayer.  It  is  not  thy  sense  of  want  that  makes  thee 
good — not  even  though  expressed  in  abjectness.  It  is  not  thy 
feeling  of  dependence  that  makes  thee  good — not  even  thy  feeling 
of  dependence  on  Christ.  It  is  the  thing  for  which  thou  prayest, 
the  thing  for  which  thou  hungerest,  the  thing  for  which  thou 

1  J.  R.  Miller,  The  Oloryof  the  Commonplace,  238. 


PETITION  91 

dependest.  Every  man  cries  for  his  grapes  of  Eshcol ;  the  differ- 
ence is  not  in  the  cry,  but  in  the  grapes.  It  is  possible  for  thee 
to  ask  from  thy  God  three  manner  of  things.  Thou  mayst  ask 
thy  neighbour's  vineyard — that  is  bad.  Thou  mayst  ask  thine 
own  riches — that  is  neither  bad  nor  good  ;  it  is  secular.  Or  thou 
mayst  ask  to  be  made  unselfish — that  is  holy.  It  is  not  thy 
prayer  that  thy  Father  prizes ;  it  is  the  direction  of  thy  prayer. 
Dost  thou  deem  thy  child  a  hero  because  he  asks  thee  for  a  holi- 
day ?  Nay,  though  he  sought  it  sorrowing  and  with  tears.  But 
if  he  asks  thee  to  let  him  share  his  joy  with  a  brother  or  sister, 
then  thou  art  exceeding  glad,  then  thou  sayest,  "Thou  art  my 
son ;  this  day  have  I  begotten  thee  ! "  So  with  thy  Father.  He 
waits  till  thou  criest  for  a  crown — till  thou  prayest  for  His 
presence,  longest  for  His  light,  sighest  for  His  song,  hungerest 
for  His  home,  faintest  for  His  footfall,  callest  for  His  company, 
tarriest  for  His  tread,  seekest  for  the  sign  of  His  coming.  That 
will  be  thy  Father's  highest  joy.^ 

I. 

We  have  begun  with  God.  We  have  considered  the  place  of 
Adoration  in  the  life  of  prayer ;  and  we  have  considered  the  place 
of  Confession.  Now  we  turn  to  Petition,  using  that  word  in  the 
sense  of  asking  blessings  for  ourselves. 

1.  What  may  we  ask  God  for  ?  The  answer  is,  "  Everything  ". 
Nothing  is  too  great  and  nothing  too  small  to  be  remembered 
before  God.  No  department  of  life  should  be  excluded  from  the 
sphere  of  prayer.  All  our  wants,  all  the  wants  of  others,  can  be 
brought  to  the  throne  of  grace.  "In  everything,"  writes  St.  Paul, 
**  by  prayer  and  supplication  with  thanksgiving  let  your  requests 
be  made  known  unto  God."  The  Christian  feels  that  there  is  no 
desire,  plan,  or  enterprise,  no  act  and  no  relationship  of  life,  in 
which  he  is  not  dependent  on  Divine  guidance,  help,  and  blessing. 
He  also  feels  that  his  relation  of  a  child  involves  the  confiding 
and  unreserved  love  which  pours  out  the  whole  heart  before  God. 
And  if  we  are  to  give  thanks  in  everything,  and  do  all  things  to 
the  glory  of  God,  how  is  it  possible  that  any  step  or  duty  or 
activity  of  life  should  be  excluded  from  our  petitions  ?  As  life 
wears  on,  brings  out  its  trials  and  reveals  its  uncertainties,  the 
religious  soul  is  more  and  more  thrown  back  on  God  as  the  only 

1  George  Matheson,  Thoughts  for  Life's  Journey ,  183. 


92       CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

One  who  knows  us,  who  fully  sympathizes  with  us,  and  who  can 
really  help  us.  Thus  the  soul  comes  to  carry  everything  to  God 
in  the  assurance  that  He  hears  us,  sympathizes  with  us,  and  will 
help  us  as  His  love  may  prompt  and  His  wisdom  may  direct.  It 
would  be  an  unreal  and  unwholesome  refinement  which  would 
seek  to  displace  this  childlike  openness  and  confidence  by  some 
colourless  and  general  expression  of  trust.  To  pray  about  every- 
thing in  submission  to  God's  will  would  be  both  more  human  and 
more  Christian  than  a  scrupulous  limitation  of  our  prayers  to 
what  we  might  think  permissible  subjects  of  petition.  God, 
without  whom  no  sparrow  falls,  and  who  numbers  the  hairs  of 
our  heads,  is  not  indifferent  to  anything  which  concerns  His 
children,  and  they  may  talk  with  Him  about  everything  with  all 
the  freedom  of  children  in  their  Father's  house. 

IF  Our  prayer  has  to  do  with  everything  that  we  experience. 
We  can  believe  ourselves  to  be  Christian,  in  the  full  sense  of  the 
term,  only  when  everything  that  moves  and  stirs  us  is  laid  by 
us  before  God  in  prayer.  When  it  thus  extends  to  everything 
that  our  life  actually  embraces,  it  brings  everything  into  con- 
nection with  the  relation  in  which  we  stand  to  God  in  Christ^ 

IF  Once,  when  Dr.  Moody  Stuart  happened  to  be  in  Huntly, 
Duncan  Matheson  took  him  to  see  some  earnest  Christian  people. 
He  visited,  among  others,  an  aged  woman  who  was  in  her  own 
way  a  "character".  Before  leaving,  he  prayed  with  her;  and 
she,  as  her  habit  was,  emphasized  each  petition  with  some  ejacula- 
tory  comment  or  note  of  assent.  Towards  the  close  of  his  prayer 
he  asked  that  God,  according  to  His  promise,  would  give  her  "  all 
things  ".  The  old  lady  interjected,  "  All  things,  na,  that  wad  be 
a  lift ".  The  mingling  of  comfort  and  dubiety  which  was  revealed 
by  the  quaint  interpolation  is  characteristic  of  the  faith  of  very 
many  of  the  children  of  God  when  they  are  brought  face  to  face 
with  some  great  promise  addressed  to  believing  prayer:  "And 
all  things  whatsoever  ye  shall  ask  in  prayer,  believing,  ye  shall 
receive " ;  "  Therefore  I  say  unto  you,  all  things  whatsoever  ye 
pray  and  ask  for,  believe  that  ye  have  received  them,  and  ye 
shall  have  them  "  ;  "  If  ye  abide  in  me,  and  my  words  abide  in 
you,  ask  whatsoever  ye  will,  and  it  shall  be  done  unto  you  ".^ 

2.  It  is  especially  to  be  remembered  that  nothing  is  too  trivial 
to  bring  to  God's  notice.     Things  seemingly  trivial  have  relation- 

^  J.  Kaftan,  Die  Christliche  Lehre  vom  Gehet,  4. 
'^  D.  M.  Mclntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  114. 


PETITION 


93 


ships  which  elevate  them  into  positions  of  supreme  moment. 
And  becoming  of  interest  to  us,  they  become  of  interest  to  Him 
who  loves  us.  The  smoothing  of  a  pillow  is  in  itself  a  trifle ; 
but  to  the  invalid  it  may  mean  refreshing  repose,  and  the 
loving  watcher  will  on  that  account  perform  this  little  act  of 
kindness.  And  thus  many  movements  of  our  lives  are  to  all  ap- 
pearance as  trifling  as  the  smoothing  of  a  pillow,  but  they  may  in 
reality  have  a  far-reaching  significance,  and  thus  become  impor- 
tant to  God  and  to  us.  We  may  not  therefore  hesitate  to  lay 
before  God,  and  to  put  into  His  hand,  anything  which  concerns 
us.  He  invites  this  confidence.  And  we  can  conclude  that  we 
trust  Him  only  when  in  this  filial  spirit  we  pour  out  our  hearts 
before  Him. 

It  has  recently  been  asserted  by  a  popular  writer  that  all 
sensible  men  will  soon  see  the  absurdity  *'  of  airing  their  egotisms 
in  God's  presence  through  prayer,  or  of  any  such  quiet  personal 
intimacy ".  Jesus  Christ,  on  the  contrary,  asserts  that  God 
is  concerned  with  the  welfare  even  of  the  lower  creation :  "  Are 
not  two  sparrows  sold  for  a  farthing  ?  and  not  one  of  them  shall 
fall  on  the  ground  without  your  Father  ".  Much  more  is  He 
concerned  with  the  details  of  human  life :  "  The  very  hairs  of 
your  head  are  all  numbered  ".  If  that  be  so,  the  "  trivial  round  " 
of  our  life  is  not  trivial  in  the  eyes  of  God,  who — albeit  He 
"  inhabiteth  Eternity " — "  yet  humbleth  himself  to  behold  the 
things  that  are  in  heaven  and  in  earth  ".  Thus  it  would  seem 
that  the  natural  and  reverent  way  of  approaching  God  is  not  to 
settle  beforehand  the  limit  of  His  power,  not  to  conclude  that  He 
can  grant  only  this  or  that  request,  but  to  take  Christ  at  His 
word,  to  tell  God  everything,  to  come  as  a  little  child  to  a  father. 
He  sees  further  than  we  do ;  and  if  in  our  blindness  we  ask  for 
that  which  will  do  more  harm  than  good,  the  Father  will  give, 
not  what  we  think  we  want,  but  what  we  really  want — give 
what  we  should  have  asked  for,  could  we  have  seen  as  far  as  He 
sees. 

God  nothing  does,  or  suffers  to  be  done 

But  thou  would'st  do  thyself,  could'st  thou  but  see 

The  end  of  all  events  as  well  as  He. 

IF  Henry  Clay  Trumbull  was  a  true  prophet  of  God  to  our 
souls.     He  spoke  forth  the  Infinite  in  the  terms  of  our  world, 


94      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

and  the  Eternal  in  the  forms  of  our  human  life.  God  was  near 
him,  almost  visible.  His  faith  in  prayer  was  one  noble  expression 
of  his  realization  of  the  present  power  of  his  Father.  Some  years 
ago  on  a  ferry  boat,  I  met  a  gentleman  who  knew  him  and  I 
told  him  that  when  I  had  last  seen  Dr.  Trumbull,  a  fortnight  be- 
fore, he  had  spoken  of  him.  "Oh,  yes!"  said  my  friend,  "he 
was  a  great  Christian,  so  real,  so  intense.  He  was  at  my  home 
years  ago,  and  we  were  talking  about  prayer.  '  Why,  Trumbull,' 
I  said,  *  you  don't  mean  to  say  that  if  you  lost  a  lead  pencil  you 
would  pray  about  it,  and  ask  God  to  help  you  find  it. '  '  Of 
course  I  would ;  of  course  I  would ! '  was  his  instant  and  excited 
reply."  How  easy  it  is  to  reproduce  the  very  sound  of  the  voice, 
to  see  the  flash  of  the  eye  and  the  trembling  gesture  of  the  hand. 
Of  course  he  would.  Was  not  his  faith  a  real  thing  ?  Like  the 
Saviour  he  put  his  doctrine  strongly  by  taking  an  extreme  illus- 
tration to  embody  his  principle,  but  the  principle  was  funda- 
mental. He  would  trust  God  in  everything.  He  did  trust  Him. 
And  the  Father  honoured  the  trust  of  His  child.^ 


II. 

1.  There  is  one  thought  that  must  always  be  present  when  we 
ask  what  things  we  may  pray  for.  All  prayer  must  be  in 
harmony  with  the  will  of  God.  This  will  be  considered  more 
fully  when  we  come  to  the  conditions  of  prayer.  But  it  must 
be  touched  upon  here  and  now.  "  Prayer  is  pleasing  to  God,  that 
is,  the  prayer  which  is  undertaken  in  [the  proper  manner.  He 
therefore,  that  desires  to  be  heard  should  pray  wisely,  fervently, 
humbly,  faithfully,  perseveringly,  confidently.  Let  him  pray 
wisely,  by  which  I  mean,  let  him  pray  for  those  things  which 
minister  to  the  Divine  glory  and  the  salvation  of  his  neighbours. 
God  is  all-powerful — therefore  do  not  in  your  prayers  prescribe 
how  He  shall  act ;  He  is  all- wise — therefore  do  not  determine 
when.  Do  not  let  your  prayers  break  forth  heedlessly,  but  let 
them  follow  the  guidance  of  faith,  remembering  that  faith  has 
steady  regard  to  the  Divine  word.  Those  things,  therefore, 
which  God  promises  absolutely  in  His  word,  those  pray  for 
absolutely.  Those  which  He  promises  conditionally — for  example, 
temporal  things — those  on  the  same  principle  pray  for  condition- 
ally.   Those  things  which  He  does  not  promise  at  all,  those  also 

1 B.  B.  Speer,  Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful,  168. 


PETITION 


95 


you  will  not  pray  for  at  all  God  often  grants  in  His  anger  what 
His  goodness  would  deny.  Therefore,  follow  Christ,  who  fully 
conforms  His  will  to  the  will  of  God."  So  wrote  the  Lutheran 
Gerhard  in  his  Holy  Meditations.  What  he  means  is  that 
prayer  is  a  form  of  intelligent  correspondence  with  the  revealed 
will  of  God.  This  is  the  thought  we  are  to  have  continually  in 
mind  when  we  attempt  to  answer  the  often  repeated  question — 
What  ought  we  to  pray  for  ? 

Our  prayers  must  be  sincere  ;  they  must  always  be  the  ex- 
pression of  our  real  mind  and  heart.  Whatever  really  moves 
and  stirs  a  Christian,  he  should  also  bring  before  God's  throne  in 
prayer.  What  is  of  importance  is  not  whether  it  is  great  or 
small,  but  only  the  relation  in  which  it  stands  to  our  spiritual 
life.  God  will  be  entreated  for  earthly  gifts  and  blessings.  It  is 
true,  as  Luther  says,  that  He  gives  them  to  us  and  to  all  men, 
without  our  praying  for  them.  Our  Father  in  heaven  knows 
what  we  need.  But  without  prayer  we  do  not  receive  them  in 
the  right  manner.  In  regard  to  such  things  there  are  only  two 
courses  open  to  men  :  either  prayer  or  over-anxiety  and  pride ; 
and  our  Lord's  injunction  is,  that  we  should  choose  the  former 
and  leave  the  latter  to  the  children  of  the  world.  But  in  praying 
for  earthly  things,  we  must  never  forget  the  subordination  of  such 
prayer  to  the  prayer  for  the  attainment  of  our  highest  aim,  our 
eternal  destiny,  or  that  all  our  earthly  circumstances  are  for 
the  purpose  of  making  us  fit  for  the  Kingdom  of  God.  We  pray, 
it  may  be,  for  the  removal  of  obstructions  that  threaten  us  in  our 
existence,  in  our  calling ;  but,  if  we  pray  aright,  there  grows  up 
out  of  this  prayer  the  other  prayer  that  such  obstructions  may 
not  hinder  us  in  the  attainment  of  our  highest  aim ;  and,  sure 
of  being  heard  in  this,  we  conclude  our  prayer  by  leaving  the 
matter  confidently  in  God's  hand.  So  also  with  all  truly  Chris- 
tian prayer  for  earthly  blessings.  With  such  prayer  the  answer 
is  immediately  and  directly  connected;  it  is  realized  in  the 
perfect  trust  that  all  things  work  together  for  good  to  them  that 
love  God.  We  do  not  have  an  absolute  promise  that  God  will 
hear  our  petitions  for  earthly  things  in  an  external  manner.  But 
we  have  the  promise  that  He  so  deals  with  us  that  nothing  will 
exceed  our  strength.  Otherwise  we  should  be  hindered  in  the 
attainment  of  our  eternal  destiny.     And  that  is  never  God's  will. 


96       CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

For  we  know  in  Christ  that  our  highest  aim  is  included  in  God's 
eternal,  loving  will.  And  the  course  of  the  world  must  abso- 
lutely conform  to  the  eternal,  loving  will  of  God. 

"  For  the  sake  of  clearness,  let  us  take  an  illustration.  From 
the  same  centre  describe  three  concentric  circles,  and  we  have 
three  zones.  In  the  inner  zone  may  be  placed  all  those  things 
which  we  know  it  is  the  will  of  God  to  give  us,  that  is,  all  things 
necessary  for  our  sanctification,  all  spiritual  blessings.  For  them 
we  can  pray  with  the  assurance  that  God  wills  to  give  them  to 
us.  In  the  outer  zone  we  may  put  those  things  which  we  know 
are  not  according  to  God's  will,  and  for  which  it  is  therefore 
wrong  to  pray,  such  as  the  satisfaction  of  a  vicious  thirst  for 
revenge,  or  success  in  some  dishonest  business  venture.  In  the 
intermediate  zone  will  be  placed  all  that  large  class  of  temporal 
blessings  which  it  may  or  may  not  be  God's  will  to  give  us,  such 
as  restoration  to  health,  or  success  in  our  temporal  affairs,  or  con- 
tinuance of  prosperity.  For  these  we  must  pray  with  the  re- 
servation that  we  ask  them  only  if  they  be  for  our  ultimate 
good,  and  therefore  in  accordance  with  God's  will.  In  regard  to 
the  matter  of  prayer,  then,  we  see  that  the  condition  is  that  it 
should  be  within  the  sphere  of  God's  will,  that  is,  something  God 
wills  to  give  us  because  it  is  for  our  good."  ^ 

But  with  this  proviso,  and  with  the  clause,  "  Nevertheless, 
not  my  will,  but  thine,"  added  to  our  petitions,  there  can  be  no 
wrong  in  making  our  requests  to  God  for  every  manner  of  bless- 
ing, material  or  other,  and  whether  on  our  own  behalf  or  on 
behalf  of  others.  Here  we  may  surely,  with  all  confidence  and 
with  all  reverence,  invoke  the  analogy  of  human  parenthood. 
No  true  earthly  parent  is  offended  or  moved  to  impatience  by 
his  children  expressing  to  him  all  their  wants  and  wishes  with 
perfect  unreserve,  even  though  his  loving  wisdom  has  anticipated 
their  real  needs,  and  will  decide  which  of  their  desires  may  be 
granted ;  indeed  the  granting  of  those  desires  may  depend  to 
some  extent  upon  the  children's  attitude,  upon  the  filial,  trustful, 
afiectionate  disposition  they  exhibit.  So  in  regard  to  the  sup- 
plications we  address  to  our  Father  in  Heaven  :  we  cannot  think 
of  His  being  moved  by  our  mere  importunity,  or  by  the  mechani- 

*  A.  G.  Mortimer. 


PETITION 


97 


cal  repetition  of  set  phrases  ;  but  that  the  fulfilment  of  some  wish 
of  ours  may  be  conditioned  by  our  humility  and  confidence  in 
expressing  it  presents  no  improbability.  In  any  case,  what  is 
necessary  on  our  part  is  that  we  should  have  faith,  not  only  in 
God's  power  to  grant  our  petitions,  but  in  His  wisdom  in  grant- 
ing or  refusing  them  as  may  be  most  expedient  for  us.  We 
ourselves  can,  within  limits,  fulfil  most  of  our  children's  requests ; 
but  a  wise  and  loving  parent  will  many  a  time  say  "  No,"  when 
his  child  may  marvel  at  what  to  him  must  seem  a  mere  arbitrary 
or  even  unkind  refusal  of  an  innocent  desire.  That  hapless  man 
of  genius,  the  late  John  Davidson,  condensed  the  truth  into  one 
illuminating  phrase  when  he  spoke  of  prayer  rightly  uttered  as 
"  submissive  aspiration "  ;  it  would  be  diflBcult  to  devise  another 
form  of  words  equally  brief  yet  containing  so  much  of  the  essence 
of  the  matter. 

IF  Even  petition  for  individual  and  material  good  is  rational 
and  morally  justifiable  if  it  be  fused  with  the  conscious  submis- 
sion of  human  to  Divine  will.  A  prayer  of  the  Khonds,  a  tribe 
of  Northern  India,  reads :  "  O  Lord,  we  know  not  what  is  good 
for  us.  Thou  knowest  it.  For  it  we  pray."  This  recalls  the 
prayer  of  Fenelon  :  "  Lord,  I  know  not  what  I  ought  to  ask  of 
Thee ;  Thou  only  knowest  what  I  need.  .  .  .  Behold  my  needs 
which  I  know  not  myself.  .  .  .  Smite  or  heal ;  depress  me  or 
raise  me  up  ;  I  adore  all  Thy  purposes  without  knowing  them ;  I 
am  silent.  ...  I  yield  myself  to  Thee.  I  would  have  no  other 
desire  than  to  accomplish  Thy  will.  Teach  me  to  pray.  Pray 
Thyself  in  me."  So  Socrates  "  prayed  simply  for  things  good, 
because  the  gods  knew  best  what  is  good  "  ;  and  St.  Paul  says 
that  "  we  know  not  what  we  should  pray  for  as  we  ought ;  but 
the  Spirit  itself  maketh  intercession  for  us".  Frederick  Robert- 
son has  said,  "  That  prayer  which  does  not  succeed  in  moderating 
our  wish,  in  changing  the  passionate  desire  into  still  submission ; 
the  anxious,  tumultuous  expectation  into  silent  surrender,  is  no 
true  prayer,  and  proves  that  we  have  not  the  spirit  of  true  prayer. 
That  life  is  most  holy  in  which  there  is  least  of  petition  and 
desire,  and  most  of  waiting  upon  God ;  that  in  which  petition 
most  often  passes  into  thanksgiving."  In  prayer  like  this, 
petition  itself  has  become  acceptance.  I  do  not  merely  surrender 
my  will,  I  identify  my  will  with  God's,  if  I  pray.  "  Even  so, 
Father :  for  so  it  seemed  good  in  thy  sight."  ^ 

1 M.  W.  Calkins,  in  The  Harvard  Theological  BevieWj  iv.  496. 

7 


98      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

2.  If  we  are  in  doubt  as  to  the  will  of  God,  there  are  two 
methods  of  coming  to  a  decision.  One  is  to  take  the  Lord's 
Prayer  as  our  model,  the  other  to  trust  to  the  guidance  of  the 
Holy  Spirit. 

(1)  Christian  prayer  is  modelled  on  the  Lord's  Prayer.  "  After 
this  manner  pray  ye."  Any  other  manner  must  be  a  wrong 
manner.  We  can  use  what  words  we  please,  but  unless  we  have 
the  manner,  the  method,  the  spirit  of  this  prayer,  we  fail  to  pray 
aright :  and  our  requests  cannot  be  granted  in  the  form  in  which 
we  make  them. 

f  Shortly  before  his  death  in  1870,  Erskine  of  Linlathen 
received  a  letter  from  his  old  friend  Carlyle,  who,  after  referring 
to  "  our  dim  sojourn,  now  grown  so  lonely  to  us,"  writes,  " '  Our 
Father  which  art  in  heaven,  Hallowed  be  Thy  name.  Thy  will  be 
done  ; ' — what  else  can  we  say  ?  The  other  night,  in  my  sleepless 
tossings  about,  which  were  growing  more  and  more  miserable, 
these  words,  that  brief  and  grand  Prayer,  came  strangely  into 
my  mind,  with  an  altogether  new  emphasis ;  as  if  written,  and 
shining  for  me  in  mild  pure  splendour,  on  the  black  bosom  of  the 
Night  there  ;  when  I,  as  it  were,  read  them  word  by  word, — with 
a  sudden  check  to  my  imperfect  wanderings,  with  a  sudden  soft- 
ness of  composure  which  was  much  unexpected.  Not  for  perhaps 
thirty  or  forty  years  had  I  once  formally  repeated  that  Prayer  ; — 
nay,  I  never  felt  before  how  intensely  the  voice  of  Man's  soul  it 
is ;  the  inmost  aspiration  of  all  that  is  high  and  pious  in  poor 
Human  Nature ;  right  worthy  to  be  recommended  with  an  '  After 
this  manner  pray  ye '."  ^ 

(2)  We  have  the  promise  of  the  Spirit.  "  For  we  know  not 
what  we  should  pray  for  as  we  ought,"  but  we  have  the  Spirit 
in  our  hearts,  crying,  Abba,  Father.  Christ  frequently  taught 
them  how  to  pray  ;  He  unveiled  the  character  of  God  who  hears 
prayer ;  He  gave  them  large  promises  to  prayer  offered  in  His 
name.  But  the  occasions  were  rare  on  which  He  mentioned 
definitely  subjects  for  prayer.  In  the  Lord's  Prayer,  He  had, 
indeed,  under  the  seven  comprehensive  petitions,  really  included 
the  desires  and  requests  of  His  people,  but  the  rest  was  left  to 
the  guidance  of  the  Holy  Spirit  and  the  growth  of  her  sense  of 
need  in  the  Church  from  age  to  age. 

^  Letters  of  Thomas  Erskine  of  Linlathen,  ii.  324. 


PETITION  99 

^  While  "  nothing  human  holds  good  before  God,  and  nothing 
but  God  himself  can  satisfy  God,"  still  it  is  possible  for  man  to 
pray  and  to  pray  aright.  For  this  is  the  revelation :  God  does 
Himself,  by  his  Holy  Spirit,  help  us  to  come  into  sympathy  with 
His  purposes  and  to  ask  according  to  His  will.  For  the  Spirit 
helpeth  our  infirmities,  and  while  we  know  not  what  to  pray  for 
as  we  ought,  maketh  intercession  for  us  with  groanings  that 
cannot  be  uttered.  And  He  that  searcheth  the  hearts  knoweth 
what  is  the  mind  of  the  Spirit,  because  He  maketh  intercession 
for  the  saints  according  to  the  will  of  God.^ 

IT  Prayer  is  the  breath  of  life,  an  effect  of  God's  spiritual 
breathing,  which  no  man  can  perform  aright  without  the  Spirit's 
breathing  upon  him.  Therefore  the  Spirit  is  to  be  waited  upon, 
for  His  breathings  and  holy  fire,  that  the  sacrifice  may  be  living, 
and  acceptable  to  the  living  God.^ 

The  prayers  I  make  will  then  be  sweet  indeed 

If  Thou  the  spirit  give  by  which  I  pray : 

My  unassisted  heart  is  barren  clay. 

That  of  its  native  self  can  nothing  feed : 

Of  good  and  pious  works  Thou  art  the  seed, 

That  quickens  only  where  Thou  say'st  it  may : 

Unless  Thou  show  to  us  Thine  own  true  way 

No  man  can  find  it :  Father  !  Thou  must  lead. 

Do  Thou,  then,  breathe  those  thoughts  into  my  mind 

By  which  such  virtue  may  in  me  be  bred 

That  in  Thy  holy  footsteps  I  may  tread  ; 

The  fetters  of  my  tongue  do  Thou  unbind. 

That  I  may  have  the  power  to  sing  of  Thee, 

And  sound  Thy  praises  everlastingly.^ 

Ill 

1.  It  is  sometimes  maintained  that  prayer  can  operate  only  in 
the  spiritual  region,  and  not  in  that  which  is  subject  to  the  reign 
of  material  law ;  or,  in  another  way  of  putting  it,  that  prayer 
should  be  only  an  offer  to  accept  God's  will,  as  expressed  in  the 
laws  of  His  universe,  and  never  an  attempt  to  influence  the 
incidence  of  those  laws.  But  this  distinction  between  the 
spiritual  and  the  material  spheres  is  as  unphilosophical  as  it  is 
unchristian. 

^  Augustus  Hopkins  Strong,  Miacellanies,  ii.  383. 
2  IsaAC  Penington.  '  Wordsworth. 


loo      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

It  is  unphilosophical,  for  it  rests  on  the  assumption  that  the 
material  order  is  a  closed  circle,  with  whose  necessary  sequence 
spirit  cannot  interfere ;  whereas  all  the  higher  philosophy  from 
Aristotle  onwards  has  maintained  that  the  universe  is  ultimately 
spiritual,  and  that  matter,  as  we  call  it,  is  a  manifestation  and  an 
instrument  of  spirit;  while  we  exemplify  the  fact  every  time 
that  our  free-will  intervenes  in  the  current  of  events,  and  should 
be  regarded  as  insane  if  we  pleaded  the  opposite  opinion  in  such 
a  practical  place  as  a  court  of  law. 

But,  besides  being  generally  unphilosophical,  the  distinction 
in  question  is  more  particularly  unchristian.  For  Christianity 
is  the  religion  of  the  Incarnation,  of  Spirit  manifest  in  matter,  of 
the  Word  made  flesh.  And  this,  its  central  doctrine,  pervades 
its  every  detail,  and  characterizes  it  through  and  through.  Its 
foundation,  as  Christians  believe,  was  accompanied  by  miracles, 
expressly  designed  to  prove  Christ's  mastery  of  material  things. 
Its  teaching  was  conveyed  through  parables  that  gave  spiritual 
significance  to  all  the  material  objects  of  the  ordinary  world. 
Its  practice  is  sustained  by  sacraments,  wherein  material  elements 
are  consecrated  to  the  assistance  of  our  spiritual  life,  while  it  bids 
us  venerate  and  discipline  our  bodies  as  being  the  temples  of  the 
Holy  Ghost.  Its  whole  purport,  in  a  word,  is  to  realize  the 
truth,  which  philosophy  and  commonsense  alike  have  recognized, 
that  the  material  machinery  of  the  world  is  subordinate  to  a 
spiritual  purpose,  in  whose  interest  it  is  meant  to  be  controlled. 
And  it  is  in  natural  accordance  with  this  that  we  are  enjoined  by 
Christ  to  pray  for  even  so  material  a  thing  as  our  daily  bread  : 
while,  at  the  same  time,  the  fact  of  its  being  made  an  object  of 
prayer,  as  well  as  the  limitation  itself  of  the  petition,  reminds  us 
that  our  daily  bread,  as  well  as  every  other  earthly  blessing  which 
the  phrase  may  be  interpreted  to  cover,  is  not  to  be  wasted  in 
selfish  enjoyment,  but  used  to  sustain  and  increase  the  energies 
that  minister,  through  the  body,  to  our  spiritual  life.  All 
temporal  blessings,  therefore,  which,  under  this  condition,  may  be 
legitimate  objects  of  desire  are  also  legitimate  objects  of  prayer. 
And  though  personal  petitions  of  this  kind  may  diminish,  in  pro- 
portion as  our  life  becomes  more  spiritual,  the  confidence  with 
which  they  are  offered  will  increase. 


PETITION  101 

IF  The  soul's  true  intercourse  with  God  in  either  sphere  must 
not  be  forgotten,  nor  the  true  harmony  between  His  methods 
in  either,  nor  the  supreme  end  to  which  all  prayer  conduces,  be 
ignored.  It  must  have  been  through  ignorance  of  these  principles 
that,  in  the  course  of  the  controversy  in  1872-73,  an  attempt 
was  made  to  limit  the  action  of  prayer  to  the  spiritual  world 
only.  Professor  Tyndall  did  not,  he  said,  contend  for  the  extinc- 
tion, but  only  for  the  displacement,  of  prayer,  and  in  a  subsequent 
paper  on  "  The  Function  of  Prayer  in  the  Economy  of  the  Uni- 
verse," the  Rev.  W.  Knight,  in  excluding  prayer  from  the 
physical  order,  pleaded  for  its  place  and  efficacy  in  the  spiritual 
region.  But,  in  reality,  the  intervention  of  a  living,  personal 
God  in  the  world  of  spirit  cannot,  for  long,  be  consistently  main- 
tained if,  on  the  hypothesis  that  it  is  inconsistent  with  the  reign 
of  law,  it  be  rejected  in  the  world  of  matter.  That  such  a  dis- 
tinction is  illogical  has  been  shown,  in  some  forcible  sentences, 
by  the  Duke  of  Argyll  in  his  Reign  of  Law  :  "| Whatever  diffi- 
culties there  may  be  in  reconciling  the  ideas  of  Law  and  of 
Volition  are  difficulties  which  apply  equally  to  the  worlds  of 
matter  and  of  mind.  The  mind  is  as  much  subject  to  law  as 
the  body  is.  The  reign  of  law  is  over  all,  and  if  its  dominion 
be  really  incompatible  with  the  agency  of  volition,  human 
and  Divine,  then  the  mind  is  as  inaccessible  to  that  agency 
as  material  things."  "  It  is  hard,"  adds  Professor  Jellett,  "  to  see 
how  the  principle  here  laid  down  can  be  disputed.  When  we  ask 
God  to  grant  us  a  spiritual  benefit,  we  ask  Him  to  intervene  in 
the  sequence  of  mental  phenomena.  If  a  change  in  the  sequence 
of  phenomena  produced  by  the  intervention  of  the  Divine  Will 
be  a  violation  of  law,  we  are  asking  for  a  violation  of  law ;  and 
this  violation  is  equally  unreal  whether  the  interrupted  sequence 
be  in  the  world  of  matter  or  the  world  of  mind."  i 

IF  It  is  arbitrary  to  confine  petitionary  prayer  to  religious 
objects  or  even  to  ethical ;  the  petition  for  bread  in  the  Lord's 
Prayer  is  clearly  opposed  to  this  super-spirituality.^ 

IF  It  is  worth  noticing  that  almost  every  prayer  addressed  to 
our  Lord  in  the  Gospels  is  for  some  temporal  blessing — usually 
for  recovery  from  sickness,  or  some  bodily  infirmity.  God  would 
surely  teach  us  that  He  desires  that  we  should  look  to  Him  in 
all  our  necessities — for  those  things  which  are  necessary  as  well 
for  the  body  as  the  soul.  Whatever  it  is  lawful  to  desire,  it  is 
lawful  to  pray  for ;  and  as  long  as  we  pray  in  faith  we  cannot 

^  A.  J.  Worlledge,  Prayer,  44. 

2  M.  Kahler,  Berechtigung  und  Zuversichtlichkeit  des  BittgebetSy  7. 


102      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

be  wrong,  though  of  course  we  may  be  mistaken  in  what  is  for 
our  real  welfare.  Faith  includes  submission  to  the  will  of  God, 
and  teaches  us  to  trust  "  Our  Father  "  as  knowing  better  than  we 
can  know  what  things  are  really  for  our  temporal  and  eternal 
good.  "  And  this  is  the  confidence  that  we  have  in  him,  that, 
if  we  ask  any  thing  according  to  his  will,  he  heareth  us :  and 
if  we  know  that  he  hear  us,  whatsoever  we  ask,  we  know  that 
we  have  the  petitions  that  we  desired  of  him."  ^ 

2.  But  we  have  to  keep  in  mind  that  Christ  has  taught  us 
that  we  are  to  "  seek  first "  the  things  which  are  spiritual  and 
eternal.  And  so  far  from  our  losing  by  following  this  order,  He 
has  assured  us  that  the  lower  good  will  be  "  added  "  to  those  who 
make  it  their  main  concern  to  win  the  higher.  The  request  for 
'  daily  bread  "  is  a  most  legitimate  request ;  but,  if  we  are  to 
pray  "  the  Lord's  Prayer,"  we  must  not  begin  with  it. 

It  is  probable  that  as  the  Christian  character  advances  to 
maturity,  and  the  vision  of  God  becomes  clearer,  the  disposition 
to  seek  for  temporal  good  will  become  less  and  less  eager  if  it 
does  not  wholly  vanish  away.  For  in  His  Presence  the  things 
which  are  often  coveted  so  earnestly  are  apt  to  wear  quite  an 
altered  aspect.  If  He  speaks,  and  we  hear  Him,  then  "  grief 
becomes  a  solemn  scorn  of  ills".  We  glory  even  in  infirmity, 
having  the  assurance  of  His  grace.  If  Christ  were  to  come  to 
us  at  our  prayers  we  could  scarcely  think  of  earthly  advantages, 
unless,  indeed,  we  ventured  so  far  for  some  brother  in  distress. 
For  ourselves,  at  such  a  time,  what  could  we  ask  for  but  forgive- 
ness, holiness,  a  heart  to  love  Him  better,  a  will  more  perfectly 
consecrated  to  His  service  ?  And  when  prayer  is  prayer  indeed, 
it  is  as  though  Christ  were  there  by  our  side,  and  we  had  come 
into  the  Holy  of  Holies.  And  even  when  no  vivid  sense  of  His 
nearness  is  granted  to  us,  yet  reflecting  on  the  uses  of  adversity 
in  sweetening  and  refining  the  souls  of  them  that  sufier,  and  ob- 
serving how  hard  and  unlovely  the  characters  of  those  who  have 
their  portion  in  this  world  often  are,  we  may  well  find  that  our 
lips  falter  as  we  begin  to  speak  of  our  desire  for  those  things 
which  nature  craves  but  which  would  appear  to  be  of  no  great 
service  to  such  as  would  have  their  place  in  the  Kingdom  of 
Heaven. 

1 K  E.  Hutton,  The  Crown  of  Christ,  ii.  138. 


PETITION  ^103 

Observe  the  order  of  progress  in  the  petitions  contained  in  the 
Bible.  More  or  less  throughout  the  Old  Testament,  but  especially 
throughout  the  earlier  period,  they  gather  round  things  material. 
Food,  drink,  and  raiment — after  these  things  the  Gentiles  seek, 
said  Jesus ;  and  the  same  might  have  been  said  of  the  average 
Hebrew.  A  perusal  of  Deut.  xxviii.  or  Lev.  xxvi.  illustrates  the 
things  which  even  to  the  later  Hebrews  constituted  a  blessing 
and  a  curse,  and  there  is  much  truth  in  Bacon's  aphorism  that 
"  prosperity  is  the  blessing  of  the  Old  Testament ".  "  The  dew  of 
heaven,  and  the  fatness  of  the  earth,  and  plenty  of  corn  and  wine  " 
— these  words  of  an  ancient  blessing  find  an  echo  very  late  in 
Hebrew  religion.  "  Thy  great  goodness,"  to  which  Ezra  refers 
in  his  prayer  of  confession,  was  represented  by  "  a  fat  land,  houses 
full  of  all  good  things,  cisterns  hewn  out,  vineyards,  and  olive- 
yards,  and  fruit  trees  in  abundance." 

Material  and  external  blessings  are  the  principal  subjects  of 
prayer  in  the  Psalms.  Account  must  be  taken,  in  considering 
this  matter,  of  changes  which  have  taken  place  in  the  meaning  of 
words  by  the  legitimate  spiritualizing  effect  of  Christian  use. 
"  Say  unto  my  soul,  I  am  thy  salvation  "  (xxxv.  3)  is  a  good  in- 
stance of  how  a  prayer  for  temporal  deliverance  has  come  to  ac- 
quire the  appearance  of  being  a  prayer  for  spiritual  blessing. 
But  although  the  Psalms  are  far  more  largely  occupied  with  tem- 
poral and  material  than  with  spiritual  needs,  yet  there  are  dis- 
tinctly spiritual  topics  of  prayer  which  fill  a  considerable  place  in 
them.  These  are :  (a)  communion  with  God,  prayer  for  the  in- 
tercourse of  prayer,  as  in  Ixiii. ;  (6)  forgiveness  of  sins,  besought 
with  the  greatest  earnestness  in  Ps.  li.  for  its  own  sake,  but  more 
frequently  taking  the  form  of  prayer  for  that  deliverance  from 
suffering  and  chastisement  which  was  held  to  mark  the  forgive- 
ness of  sin ;  (c)  Ps.  cxix.  stands  on  a  different  footing.  It  con- 
tains much  prayer  for  a  knowledge  of  God's  will  The  prayer  for 
"quickening"  seems  distinctly  to  have  a  spiritual  sense.  The 
development  of  prayer  in  a  spiritual  direction  has  been  carried 
some  way  in  the  Psalms,  and  prayer  for  external  blessings  has 
been  cast  in  a  form  which  will  lend  itself  afterwards  to  spiritual 
interpretation. 

In  the  New  Testament,  prayer  is,  as  we  might  expect,  pre- 
dominantly for  things  spiritual.     Doubtless  material  things  could 


104      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

not  be  altogether  ignored  or  forgotten ;  had  not  the  Master  Him- 
self taught  His  disciples  to  pray  for  bread,  and  had  He  not  made 
upon  them  the  impression  that  any  request  they  made  in  His 
name  would  be  answered  ?  But  requests  by  such  men  and  in 
such  a  name  would  be  overwhelmingly  for  things  spiritual.  Those 
whose  ambition  was  to  "abide  in  Him,"  would  not  be  sorely 
troubled  by  ambitions  of  a  worldly  kind. 

IT  I  often  think  that  the  progress  of  religion  is  shown  nowhere 
with  more  clearness  than  in  the  development  that  has  slowly 
taken  place  in  the  character  of  prayer.  So  much  of  prayer  has 
been  on  the  quid  pro  quo  principle.  Men  have  tried  to  bargain 
with  God,  to  talk  Him  round  to  their  view  of  the  case  ;  to  get 
Him  to  do  something  for  them  that  He  must  not  do  for  others, 
so  that  prayer  has  been  really  the  earnest  pleading  that  our  will 
may  be  done,  and  not  the  Divine  will.  "O  Allah,  give  me  a 
hundred  sequins,"  the  Polynesian  idolaters  prayed,  and  whipped 
their  unpropitious  gods.  But  how  different  was  the  prayer  on  the 
lips  or  in  the  Hf  e  of  our  blessed  Lord  ?  ^ 

IT  Such  was  the  society  in  which  I  was  living  at  that  age  when 
a  youth  is  so  easily  swayed ;  and  I  was  studying  books  which 
taught  eloquence,  in  which  I  desired  to  excel,  seeking  by  means 
of  the  satisfaction  of  human  vanity  an  end  that  was  itself  evil 
and  vain,  when  in  the  usual  course  of  reading  I  came  to  a  book 
of  one  Cicero,  whose  eloquence,  though  not  his  character,  is  almost 
universally  admired.  This  book  of  his  is  called  the  Hortensius, 
and  contains  an  exhortation  to  the  study  of  philosophy.  That 
book  changed  my  whole  attitude,  changed  the  prayers  which  I 
offered  to  Thee,  and  made  all  my  desires  and  aspirations  different 
from  what  they  had  been.  All  at  once  every  hope  that  was  set 
on  vanity  seemed  worthless,  and  I  desired  with  an  incredible  in- 
tensity of  emotion  the  immortality  with  which  philosophy  is  con- 
cerned, and  I  began  to  rise  up  that  I  might  return  unto  Thee.^ 

IF  When  our  persuasion  of  the  guidance  and  the  goodness  of 
God  is  firm  and  clear,  prayer  becomes  a  true  pleasure  and  strength 
of  soul.  If  our  vision  of  God  is  unclouded,  we  are  instant  in 
prayer,  and  pray  without  ceasing.  The  fully  believing  spirit  re- 
joices to  be  in  perpetual  communion  with  God.  In  work  and 
worship,  in  joy  and  grief,  in  giving  and  doing,  in  hours  of  triumph 
and  hours  of  trial,  the  surely  persuaded  soul  casts  itself  upon  God 

*  Oeorge  Henry  Russell  Oarcia,  205. 
^  St.  Augustine,  Confessions,  24. 


PETITION  105 

with  the  confidence  of  undoubting  love.  When  God  is  the  greatest 
of  all  realities  to  the  soul,  prayer  is  the  sweetest  of  all  rejoicings. 
The  clear  consciousness  and  firm  conviction  of  God  compel  fre- 
quency and  gladness  in  prayer.-^ 

3.  Last  of  all,  let  us  not  forget  that  prayer  for  material  things 
may  be  denied  because  to  grant  it  would  be  to  the  hindrance  of 
spiritual  things.  Jeremiah,  beyond  almost  any  other  prophet, 
was  of  a  warm  emotional  nature,  keenly  alive  to  all  that  was 
going  on  around  him  ;  and  with  this  he  had  a  prophet's  insight 
into  the  needs  of  his  country,  and  all  a  prophet's  readiness  to 
respond  to  the  touch  of  the  Divine  hand.  A  grievous  drought 
had  fallen  upon  Judah,  so  that  "  the  gates  thereof  languish ;  they 
are  black  upon  the  ground ;  and  the  cry  of  Jerusalem  is  gone 
up  ".  The  prophet,  interpreting  this  as  a  sign  of  Jehovah's  anger, 
intercedes  on  behalf  of  his  people :  "O  thou  hope  of  Israel,  .  .  . 
why  shouldest  thou  be  as  a  man  astonied,  as  a  mighty  man  that 
cannot  save  ?  Yet  thou,  O  Lord,  art  in  the  midst  of  us,  and  we 
are  called  by  thy  name ;  leave  us  not."  But  Jehovah  replies  that 
He  will  accept  no  intercession  for  the  people.  "  Pray  not  for 
this  people  for  their  good.  ...  I  will  not  accept  them ;  but  I 
will  consume  them  by  the  sword,  and  by  the  famine,  and  by  the 
pestilence."  Again  the  prophet  pleads  in  more  beseeching  tones, 
and  again  his  intercession  is  rejected,  even  more  decisively  than 
before:  "Though  Moses  and  Samuel  stood  before  me,  yet  my 
mind  could  not  be  toward  this  people.  ...  I  am  weary  with  re- 
penting ...  I  will  bereave  them  of  children,  I  will  destroy  my 
people,  .  .  .  and  the  residue  of  them  will  I  deliver  to  the  sword 
before  their  enemies,  saith  the  Lord."  It  is  one  of  the  most 
pathetic  situations  in  the  Bible.  The  passionate,  tender-hearted 
prophet  wrestling  in  prayer  for  his  people,  and  his  prayer  not 
granted  !  Here  we  come  upon  a  profound  piece  of  teaching.  We 
must  not  expect  God  to  give  physical  deliverance  when  we  pray 
for  it.  There  is  a  higher  interest  at  stake,  a  higher  law  which 
must  be  obeyed.  The  prophet  prayed  for  Israel's  deliverance, 
but  Jehovah  revealed  that  His  holy  purpose  must  be  accomplished 
not  by  deliverance  but  by  punishment;  the  supreme  spiritual 
law  required  that  the  doom  of  Jerusalem  should  not  be  deferred. 

^  J.  W.  Diggle,  Sermons  for  Daily  Life,  1. 


lo6      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

The  same  profound  lesson  we  learn  in  the  Garden  of  Gethsemane. 
Even  to  the  Well-beloved  the  Father  denied  the  passing  of  the 
bitter  cup;  He  must  drink  it;  so  supreme  are  spiritual  over 
physical  things.  We  can  pray  for  the  latter  only  conditionally  : 
"  Father,  if  it  be  passible  :  not  my  will,  but  thine,  be  done  ". 

IT  As  Jesus  moved  about,  and  men  drew  near  to  Him,  nine 
times  out  of  ten  the  things  they  cried  for  could  scarcely  be  called 
spiritual  at  all.  They"  prayed  for  sight.  They  prayed  for 
physical  power.  They  prayed  that  a  son  or  daughter  might  be 
healed.  They  prayed  in  the  wild  uproar  of  the  storm,  "Lord 
save  us  from  this  tempest,  or  we  perish ".  And  what  I  say  is 
that  for  one  like  Jesus,  to  whom  the  spiritual  overshadowed 
everything,  such  ceaseless  praying  for  the  physical  and  temporal 
must  have  made  heavier  the  cross  He  bore.  It  deepens  the 
wonder  of  His  patience  to  remember  that.  It  sheds  a  light  on 
His  infinite  compassion.  Fain  would  He  have  been  asked  for 
deeper  things,  yet  He  never  wearied  in  bestowing  these  things.^ 

^  G.  H.  Morrison,  The  Afterglow  of  God,  16. 


VL 

Intercession. 


Literature. 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H.,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 

Binnie,  W.,  Sermons  (1887). 

Bounds,  E.  M.,  Purpose  in  Prayer  (1914). 

Cooke,  G.  A. ,  The   Progress  of  Revelation  (1910). 

Dickie,  W.,  The  Culture  of  the  Spiritual  Life  (1905). 

Douglas,  A.  F.,  Prayer :  A  Practical  Treatise  (1901). 

Gladden,  W.,  Burning  Questions  (1890). 

Gordon,  S.  D.,  Quiet  Talks  on  Prayer. 

,j  „         Quiet  Talks  with  World-Winners  (190S). 

Gore,  C,  St.  Paul's  Epistle  to  the  Romans,  i.  (1899). 
Hall,  A.  C.  A.,  The  Christian  Doctrine  of  Prayer  (1904). 
Horton,  R.  F.,  My  Belief  (1908). 
How,  W.  W.,  Plain  Words,  iv.  (1901). 
Illingworth,  J.  R.,  Christian  Character  (1904). 
Ingram,  A.  F.  W.,  Banners  of  the  Christian  Faith  (1899). 
Law,  W.,  A  Serio^is  Call  to  a  Devout  and  Holy  Life. 
McComb,  S.,  Christianity  and  the  Modern  Mind  (1910). 
McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 
Moule,  H.  C.  G.y  All  in  Christ  (1901). 

„  „  Secret  Prayer  (1889). 

Murray,  J.  O.,  in  Princeton  Sermons  (1893). 
Orchard,  W.  E.,  Problems  and  Perplexities  (1912). 
Pusey,  E.  B.,  Occasional  Sermons  (1884). 
Roberts,  J.  E.,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions  (1908). 
ShiUito,  E.,  Looking  Inwards  (1912). 
Warschauer,  J.,  Problems  of  Immanence  (1909). 
Watt,  L.  M.,  God's  Altar  Stairs  (1899). 

Whyte,  A.,  Lancelot  Andrewes  and  His  Private  Devotions  (1896). 
Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 
Expository  Times,  xvi.  (1905). 


io8 


Intercession. 

1.  ''And  there  were  also  with  him  other  little  ships"  (Mark  iv. 
36).  Our  attention,  as  we  read  the  story  of  the  stilling  of  the 
storm,  is  given  to  the  ship  in  which  Christ  and  the  disciples  were. 
We  do  not  notice  that  there  were  also  with  Him  other  little  ships. 
But  it  is  worth  noticing.  For  if  they  suffered  from  the  storm, 
they  also  got  the  benefit  of  the  "  great  calm  ".  And  they  never 
knew  how  it  came  to  pass.  They  were  out  on  the  Sea  of  Galilee, 
along  with  the  ship  in  which  were  Christ  and  the  disciples. 
When  the  storm  came  down  so  violently,  they  too  were  tossed  by 
the  waves  and  in  danger  of  being  swamped.  And  then  when  He 
said,  "Peace,  be  still,"  and  there  was  a  great  calm,  they  enjoyed 
the  benefit  of  the  calm.  How  did  it  come  about  ?  How  was  it  so 
sudden  and  so  complete  ?  It  is  probable  that  they  never  knew. 
Tennyson  says : — 

More  things  are  wrought  by  prayer 
Than  this  world  dreams  of. 

And  the  wonder  of  it  is  that  the  things  which  are  wrought  by 
prayer  are  often  wrought  on  those  who  have  not  themselves 
prayed,  and  they  may  never  know  how  their  blessings  came  to 
them.  Have  we  been  rescued  out  of  keen  temptations  ?  Have 
we  been  able  to  do  some  things  for  God,  and  to  stand  ?  Have 
we  sometimes  felt  the  peace  of  God  which  passeth  understanding 
keep  our  heart  and  mind  ?  We  believe  that  it  was  in  answer  to 
prayer.  But  whose  prayer  ?  Not  our  own.  A  mother  s  prayer, 
perhaps.  We  cannot  always  tell.  In  all  prayer  there  is  mystery. 
But  the  mystery  centres  in  intercessory  prayer.  That  we  should 
be  blessed  because  of  some  other's  prayer  of  faith  ;  that  our 
prayer  of  faith  should  be  able  to  bless  others — that  is  the  mystery. 
But  the  examples  of  it  are  undeniable. 

Four  men  carried  a  paralytic  into  the  presence  of  Jesus,  and 
when  Jesus  saw  their  faith,  He  said  to  the  sick  of  the  palsy, 

log 


no      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

"  Son,  be  of  good  cheer ;  thy  sins  be  forgiven  thee  ".  A  woman 
came  out  of  the  Syrophoenician  country  and  cried,  saying,  "  Have 
mercy  on  me,  O  Lord,  thou  son  of  David;  my  daughter  is 
grievously  vexed  with  a  devil ".  He  answered  and  said  unto  her, 
"  O  woman,  great  is  thy  faith  ;  be  it  unto  thee  even  as  thou  wilt  ". 

(1)  What  is  the  secret  ?  It  is  sympathy.  The  prayer  that 
saves  is  the  prayer  that  sympathizes.  The  boat  in  which  Christ 
was  and  the  other  little  boats  were  all  suffering  alike  from  the 
storm,  and  to  sympathize  is  to  suffer  along  with.  The  four  friends 
of  the  paralytic  felt  with  him  as  they  felt  for  him.  The  Syro- 
phoenician woman  carried  her  daughter's  illness  as  if  it  were  her 
own.  "  Lord  save  me,"  was  her  cry.  Why  have  we  a  Saviour 
who  is  able  to  save  unto  the  uttermost  ?  Because  "  himself 
took  our  infirmities,  and  bare  our  diseases  ". 

(2)  And  the  prayer  of  sympathy,  if  it  is  to  be  entirely  success- 
ful, must  be  a  prayer  of  faith.  That  is  the  other  condition.  We 
must  believe  that  He  is  able  to  do  this,  and  that  He  is  willing. 

More  things  are  wrought  by  prayer 

Than  this  world  dreams  of.     Wherefore,  let  thy  voice 

Rise  like  a  fountain  for  me  night  and  day.  .  .  . 

For  so  the  whole  round  earth  is  every  way 

Bound  by  gold  chains  about  the  feet  of  God. 

IF  To  God  man  is  first  an  objective  point,  and  then,  without 
ceasing  to  be  that,  he  further  becomes  a  distributing  centre,  God 
ever  thinks  of  a  man  doubly :  first  for  his  own  self,  and  then  for 
his  possible  use  in  reaching  others.  Communion  and  petition  fix 
and  continue  one's  relation  to  God,  and  so  prepare  for  the  great 
out-reaching  form  of  prayer-intercession.  Prayer  must  begin  in 
the  first  two  but  reaches  its  climax  in  the  third.  Communion 
and  petition  are  of  necessity  self -wide.  Intercession  is  world- 
wide in  its  reach.  And  all  true  rounded  prayer  will  ever  have 
all  three  elements  in  it.  There  must  be  the  touch  with  God. 
One's  constant  needs  make  constant  petition.  But  the  heart  of 
the  true  follower  has  caught  the  warm  contagion  of  the  heart  of 
God  and  reaches  out  hungrily  for  the  world.  Intercession  is  the 
climax  of  prayer.^ 

IF  I  cannot  contentedly  frame  a  prayer  for  myself  in  particular 
without  a  catalogue  for  my  friends;  nor  request  a  happiness 
wherein  my  sociable  disposition  doth  not  desire  the  fellowship  of 

^  S.  D.  Gordon,  Quiet  Talks  on  Prayer,  40. 


INTERCESSION  iii 

my  neighbour.  I  never  hear  the  toll  of  a  passing-bell,  though  in 
my  mirth,  without  my  prayers  and  best  wishes  for  the  departing 
spirit.  I  cannot  go  to  cure  the  body  of  my  patient,  but  I  forget 
my  profession  and  call  upon  God  for  his  soul.  I  cannot  see  one 
say  his  prayers,  but,  instead  of  imitating  him,  I  fall  into  suppli- 
cation for  him,  who  perhaps  is  no  more  than  a  common  nature.^ 


1.  Intercession  has,  in  every  age,  been  the  cherished  practice 
of  the  people  of  God,  cherished  because  it  was  felt  to  be  a  duty. 
"  I  exhort  therefore,  first  of  all,  that  supplications,  prayers,  inter- 
cessions, thanksgivings,  be  made  for  all  men.  .  .  .  This  is  good 
and  acceptable  in  the  sight  of  God  our  Saviour  ;  who  willeth  that 
all  men  should  be  saved,  and  come  to  the  knowledge  of  the  truth." 
In  these  familiar  words  St.  Paul  seems  to  speak  with  all  the  force 
and  authority  of  one  who  has  been  allowed  to  enjoy  a  clear  revela- 
tion of  the  Divine  will  on  this  most  important  topic.  His  ex- 
hortation is  rendered  all  the  more  impressive  by  the  reference  to 
the  Divine  desire  for  the  salvation  of  all  that  immediately  follows 
it.  If  it  is  the  will  of  God  that  all  men  should  be  saved — and 
He,  through  His  servant,  exhorts  us  to  intercede  for  all — it  is 
clear  that  intercession  must  be,  at  least,  one  amongst  the  many 
means  that  God  employs  for  the  carrying  out  of  His  beneficent 
purpose.  If,  indeed,  no  such  exhortation  had  been  addressed  to 
us,  our  natural  instincts  of  Christian  benevolence  would  have 
disposed  us  to  intercede  for  our  fellow-men.  If  we  believe  that 
it  is  right  to  pray  for  ourselves,  we  are  inclined,  almost  without  a 
second  thought,  to  conclude  that  it  must  be  equally  right  to  plead 
for  other  people,  and  to  take  it  for  granted  that  if  our  prayers 
are  to  our  own  advantage,  they  must  be  equally  effective  and 
beneficial  when  offered  for  others. 

When  we  find  that,  from  the  days  of  Abraham  downwards, 
God's  people  have  interceded  for  others,  and  have  been  encouraged 
to  do  so ;  when  we  notice  that  our  Lord  Himself  prayed  for 
others,  and  taught  His  disciples  to  do  so,  yes,  even  for  those  who 
despitefuUy  used  them  ;  when  we  find  St.  Paul  exhorting  us,  in 
the  most  emphatic  way,  to  engage  in  intercession,  the  weight  of 
a  Divine  authority  in  favour  of  the  practice  of  intercession  over- 

^  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  Beligio  Medici. 


112      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

bears  all  the  objections  to  such  a  course  that  reason  may  present, 
and  we  conclude  that  our  truest  wisdom  lies  in  doing  just  what 
we  are  told  to  do,  even  though  our  taking  this  course  may  seem 
to  involve  certain  anomalies. 

IT  My  father  was  most  thoroughly  a  man  of  prayer.  He  was 
often  supplicating  for  himself ;  and,  as  for  his  intercourse  with 
others,  he  was  in  the  habit,  as  far  as  possible,  of  leaving  no  one 
with  whom  he  felt  himself  in  communion  without  praying  with 
him.  Never  did  he  set  out  from  home ;  never  did  he  see  any  of 
us,  or  even  a  friend,  set  out,  without  assembling  all  the  household 
to  commend  to  the  Supreme  Head  those  who,  however  they  might 
be  separated  from  one  another,  were  still  one  under  His  eye.  So, 
too,  the  first  thing  he  did  on  his  return  from  a  journey,  after  he 
had  embraced  us  all  round,  was  to  return  thanks  to  God  for  the 
protection  He  had  vouchsafed  to  him  and  us,  and  for  His  mercy 
in  reuniting  us.  Never  did  he  sit  down  to  table,  were  it  only  to 
take  a  basin  of  broth,  without  first  bending  his  head  a  few 
moments  to  return  thanks,  whether  he  were  in  his  room,  or 
among  his  family,  or  at  a  table  d'hote  surrounded  by  strangers. 
It  was  in  this  necessity  which  lay  upon  him  to  ask  God's  help  in 
everything  that  he  illustrated  his  view  of  the  principle,  "all 
things  of  God,"  his  dogmatic  expression  of  which  has  pained  so 
many  people.  "  We  must  go  to  God  at  once,"  he  used  to  say  to 
us,  **  and  not  wait  till  we  have  exhausted  all  other  means.  Before 
deciding  on,  or  undertaking  anything,  whatever  it  be,  we  should 
never  forget  to  ask  counsel  of  the  Lord."  ^ 

2.  The  prayers  of  the  Bible  are  a  singularly  interesting  and 
instructive  study.  They  are  more  numerous  than  can  well  be 
imagined  by  those  of  us  who  have  not  devoted  to  them  any 
special  attention.  One  circumstance  of  special  interest  in  such 
a  study  is  this,  that  so  large  a  proportion  of  the  great  prayers 
of  the  Bible  are  intercessions.  Surely  this  feature  in  the  great 
Bible  prayers  is  noteworthy.  It  would) seem  that  while  all  prayer 
is  welcome  in  heaven — all  true  prayer,  that  is — a  special  welcome 
awaits  the  prayers  we  offer,  not  for  ourselves,  but  for  others. 

(1)  In  the  Old  Testament  prayers  of  intercession  are  not  very 
numerous,  but  they  are  of  great  significance.  It  would  not  be 
unfair  to  estimate  a  man's  religion  by  the  earnestness  with  which 
he  longs  for  the  welfare  of  others ;  and  love  of  the  brethren  will 

1  The  Life,  Labours,  and  Writings  of  Ccesar  Malan,  334. 


INTERCESSION  113 

express  itself,  in  normal  circumstances,  in  prayer  for  them.    Those 
who  love  them  most  and  those  who  are  most  responsible  for  their 
spiritual  welfare  will  be  likely  to  pray  most  for  them.     It  is, 
therefore,  very  fitting  that  the  prophets,  who  in  a  special  sense 
were  charged  with  the  religious  welfare  of  Israel,  should  so  often 
appear  as   intercessors.     We   think   of   them  pre-eminently   as 
preachers,  but  they  had  first  pleaded  with  God  for  the  men  to 
whom  they  afterwards  appealed  in  His  name.     Most  of  them 
must  have  been  powerful,  or  at  least  impressive  speakers.     Their 
gifts  and  temperaments  differ  widely,  but  the  passionate  sincerity 
of  such  men  as   Elijah   and  Jeremiah  must  have  produced  a 
stupendous    impression   even  upon    audiences  that    were    not 
disposed   to  accept   their   message ;    and   we  can   well   believe 
that  a  special  efficacy  was  supposed  to  attach  to  their  prayers. 
Practically  all  the  intercessory  prayers  of  the  Old  Testament 
are  offered  either  by  prophets  or  by  men — such  as  Abraham 
and  Job — whom  later  ages  idealized  as  prophets.     Abraham's 
intercession  for  Sodom  and  for  King  Abimelech,  and  Job's  inter- 
cession for  his  friends  are  characteristic :  and  their  prayers  are 
efficacious.     "  Abraham  is  a  prophet,  and  he  shall  pray  for  thee, 
and  thou  shalt  live."     *'  My  servant  Job  shall  pray  for  you," 
that  is,  for  the  "orthodox  "  friends,  who  had  not  spoken  of  God 
the  thing  that  was  right.     The  historical  prophets  from  Elijah 
onwards   appear   frequently  as   intercessors.      Elijah   prays  for 
the  restoration  of  the  widow's  son.     Amos  the  stern,  from  whom 
one  would  expect  little  pity,  pleaded  twice  that  the  blow  should 
not  fall  upon  Israel.     King  Hezekiah  after  the  insulting  message 
of  the  Rabshakeh,  entreats  Isaiah  through  the  priests  and  two 
court  officials  to  "  lift  up  his  prayer  for  the  remnant  that  is  left "  ; 
and  the  chronicler  puts  into  the  mouth  of  Hezekiah  himself  a 
very  beautiful  prayer  to  "Jehovah  the  good"  for  pardon  for 
those  who  had  earnestly  sought  their  God,  even  though  their  con- 
duct had  not  been  ceremonially  correct. 

If  The  praying  of  others  for  us  is  a  force  to  be  reckoned — when 
we  account  for  the  startling  variations  of  our  life,  its  deflections, 
its  unexpected  reinforcements.  In  the  prologue  to  the  Book  of 
Job  we  read :  "  And  it  was  so,  when  the  days  of  their  feasting 
were  gone  about,  that  Job  sent  and  sanctified  them,  and  rose  up 
early  in  the  morning,  and  offered  burnt-offerings  according  to  the 

8 


114      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

number  of  them  all ;  for  Job  said :  It  may  be  that  my  sons  have 
sinned  and  renounced  God  in  their  hearts ".  It  is  the  anxious 
prayer  of  Job  that  we  hear,  but  what  followed  upon  that  vicari- 
ous prayer?  This  only  experience  can  teach.  Other  fathers 
have  prayed  for  their  children  since  that  day,  and  their  sons  and 
daughters  have  been  held  back  as  by  an  Unseen  Hand  from  the 
excesses  and  the  stains  of  the  world — they  have  been  brought 
through  their  perilous  journey  unscathed,  not  alone  because  they 
prayed  themselves,  but  because  their  father  and  mother  rose  up 
early  and  sanctified  them  and  offered  burnt-offerings  for  them. 
They  have  had  great  allies,  and  all  about  them  the  unseen 
"  dynamic  agencies  of  heaven  ".^ 

(2)  In  the  Old  Testament,  intercessory  prayer  is  usually 
offered  for  forfeited  or  imperilled  lives ;  in  the  New  Testament 
its  object  is  usually  the  spiritual  welfare  of  those  for  whom  it  is 
offered,  as  when  Jesus  prays  that  Peter's  faith  fail  not ;  or  Paul, 
that  his  Ephesian  converts  be  strengthened  with  power  in  the 
inward  man,  or  that  the  Philippians  may  abound  more  and  more 
in  love.  There  are  occasional  prayers  for  blessings  of  a  more 
material  sort.  The  elders  of  the  church  are  to  pray  for  a  sick 
member,  and  Peter  prays  for  the  restoration  of  the  dead  Tabitha. 
The  "  great  Prophet  that  should  come  into  the  world,"  like  the 
ancient  prophets,  was  great  in  intercession.  He  poured  out  His 
heart  not  only  for  His  disciples,  but  for  His  murderers. 

IF  Jesus,  who  has  entire  command  of  His  time,  chooses  the 
Intercession  as  that  on  which  He  can  best  spend  it,  and  ever 
liveth  to  make  intercession  for  us.2 

IF  As  intercession  for  others,  how  prayer  rises  and  swells  into 
moral  grandeur  and  moral  worth !  Jesus  standing  with  His 
disciples  about  the  table  on  which  the  sacrament  of  the  last  supper 
was  yet  to  be  celebrated,  and  as  they  were  about  to  start  for  the 
garden  across  the  brook  Kedron,  lifts  His  eyes  to  heaven.  But 
He  has  already  looked  down  through  the  ages,  far  across  con- 
tinents then  unknown,  and  sees  the  fast  gathering  throng  of  His 
disciples ;  sees  them  toiling,  witnessing,  sufiering  for  His  sake ; 
sees  the  faithful  leaders  in  one  generation  die,  and  those  of  the 
next  run  to  take  their  places ;  sees  all  the  dreadful  corruptions, 
all  the  stem  conflicts,  all  the  sad  heresies  and  schisms,  all  the 
triumphs  too,  and  growths  as  the  blessed  leaven  slowly  leavens 

1  Edward  Shillito,  Looking  Inwards,  50. 

«  F.  W.  OroBBley,  in  Life,  by  J.  Rendel  Harris,  174. 


INTERCESSION  115 

the  whole  lump ;  and  as  He  looks  on  the  whole  up  to  the  very 
end,  He  prays  for  all  those  who  should  believe  on  Him  through 
the  word  of  His  apostles.  And  from  this  scene  on  earth  we  look 
reverently  up  to  His  throne  in  heaven,  where  He  ever  liveth  to 
make  intercession  for  us.^ 

(3)  Intercessory  prayer  plays  a  great  part  in  the  life  of  St. 
Paul.  It  is  the  old  story :  the  true  prophet,  the  preacher  who 
means  what  he  says,  will  be  an  intercessor.  The  man  who  loves 
the  truth  and  who  also  loves  the  men  to  whom  he  preaches  it, 
will  plead  for  them.  So  not  only  Paul's  heart's  desire,  but  also 
his  supplication  to  God  for  the  Jews,  was  that  they  should  be 
saved.  And  once  men  have  been  won  for  Jesus,  he  prays  that 
they  may  be  sustained  in  the  good  life,  and  enabled  to  bring  forth 
much  fruit,  and  this  to  the  ultimate  end  "  that  the  name  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  may  be  glorified  ".  He  prays  not  only  that  they  may 
do  no  evil,  but  that  they  may,  in  a  spirit  of  blameless  sincerity, 
do  much  good,  especially  that  they  may  put  into  practice  the 
Master's  royal  lesson  of  love  to  one  another,  and  to  all  men. 

So  St.  Paul  tells  us  that  Epaphras  was  always  striving 
and  labouring  in  prayer  for  the  Colossians  that  they  might  be 
perfect  and  fully  convinced  in  all  the  will  of  God.  While  Epaphras 
prayed,  what  happened  at  Colossae  ?  This  the  New  Testament 
leaves  untold.  It  would  be  little  good  to  tell  us ;  we  must  learn 
from  experience  what  happened  at  Colossae.  While  Epaphras 
prayed !  Who,  in  the  light  of  Christian  experience,  can  doubt 
that  souls  in  Colossae  found  the  shadows  strangely  lifted  ?  They 
were  led  into  a  deeper  insight  into  the  will  of  God ;  they  received 
a  new  power  to  preach  Christ ;  they  were  made  brave  who  before 
had  been  timid;  they  were  made  quick  with  the  love  of  Christ 
who  had  almost  lost  their  faith.  All  this  and  more  took  place, 
while  in  Rome  their  friend  and  Apostle  strove  with  God  in  prayer 
and  worked  mightily  for  their  salvation. 

IT  While  Epaphras  prays  to-day,  what  happens  ?  He  may  be 
thousands  of  miles  away ;  he  may  be  in  China  and  his  Colossae 
in  London.  But  we  must  not  forget  him  when  in  a  certain 
church  some  harassed  soul  finds  rest ;  when  this  man  is  dragged 
with  the  fire  on  his  garments  from  destruction ;  when  this  one 
passes  into  the  joy  of  his  Lord  by  the  way  of  the  Cross ;  when 

^  J.  0.  Murray,  in  Princ6ton  Sermofis,  206. 


ii6      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

underneath  some  fellowship  of  Christians  there  is  a  strange  arm 
outstretched.  That  arm  is  the  intercession  of  the  redeemed 
taken  into  the  intercession  of  the  Redeemer.  For  He  takes  for 
Himself  the  "  golden  bowls  full  of  incense,  which  are  the 
prayers  of  the  saints  ".     All  this  we  shall  not  know  until  we 

Stand  with  Christ  in  glory, 
Looking  o'er  life's  finished  story. ^ 

IF  In  that  brief  but  all-embracing  intercession  with  which  the 
Bible  closes  we  have  intercession  at  its  highest  level :  "  And  the 
Spirit  and  the  bride  say,  Come.  And  he  that  heareth,  let  him 
say,  Come.  Amen  :  come,  Lord  Jesus."  Notice  the  combination, 
the  threefold  cord  which  cannot  be  broken.  There  is  the  prayer 
of  the  Spirit.  St.  John,  like  St.  Paul,  brings  the  action  of  the 
Spirit  into  close  relation  with  the  prayers  of  the  Christian  faith- 
ful "  The  Spirit  himself  maketh  intercession  for  us  with  groan- 
ings  which  cannot  be  uttered".  "Through  your  supplication 
and  the  supply  of  the  Spirit  of  Jesus  Christ  " — it  is  by  this  that 
outward  events  are  turned  to  our  salvation.  Just  as  the  true  life 
for  the  Christian  means  to  walk  in  the  Spirit,  so  true  Christian 
prayer  is  prayer  in  the  Spirit.  The  Spirit  prays,  and  the  Bride,  the 
Church,  the  Spirit-bearing  body,  prays  too.  And  the  individual 
disciple  contributes  his  voice  to  theirs ;  "  he  that  heareth,"  he  has 
his  part  in  the  threefold  strain  of  intercession.  "  Come,  Lord 
Jesus."  The  prayer  is  short,  but  it  covers  all  that  we  can  pray 
for.2 

3.  With  such  examples  before  us,  we  cannot  afford  to  neglect 
intercession.  Indeed,  we  may  well  ask  whether  we  have  given 
anything  like  an  adequate  place  to  this  most  blessed  and  wonder- 
ful gift  from  God.  The  Rev.  J.  R.  Miller  has  in  one  of  his  books 
a  chapter  entitled  "  The  Sin  of  Not  Praying  for  Others,"  and  he 
writes :  "  Perhaps  we  are  not  accustomed  to  think  of  praying  for 
others  in  just  this  way  as  a  duty,  the  omission  of  which  is  a  sin 
against  God.  We  think  of  it  as  a  privilege,  but  scarcely  as  a 
part  of  love's  solemn  duty.  We  are  in  danger  of  narrowing  our 
prayers  to  ourselves  and  our  own  wants.  We  think  of  our  own 
sorrows  and  trials,  our  own  duties,  our  own  work,  our  own 
spiritual  growth,  and  too  often  do  not  look  out  of  the  window 
upon  our  friend's  rough  path  or  sore  struggle.     But  selfishness 

1  Edward  Shillito,  Looking  Inwards,  61. 

>  G.  A.  Cooke,  The  Progress  of  Bevelation,  160. 


INTERCESSION  117 

in  praying  is  one  of  the  worst  forms  of  selfishness.  If  ever  love 
reaches  its  best  and  purest,  it  ought  to  be  when  we  are  standing 
before  God."  Not  praying  for  others  is  a  sin  of  omission  which 
should  be  sincerely  repented  of,  and  of  which  no  Christian  should 
be  guilty  again. 

Suppose  you  are  interested  in  a  case  of  sickness,  and  you 
believe  your  prayer  has  had  an  effect  which  otherwise  could  not 
have  been  achieved,  does  not  this  commit  into  your  hands  an 
awful  responsibility  ?  What  if  you  forgot  to  pray  ?  Or  suppose 
that  there  is  another  sick  person  for  whom  there  is  no  one  to 
pray,  and  that  person  therefore  dies.  Is  it  either  wise  or  fair 
for  God  to  allow  such  things  to  depend  upon  such  precarious 
conditions  ?  But,  taking  this  argument  on  its  own  merits,  it 
could  be  pressed  much  further.  Is  it  also  wise  or  fair  that 
such  matters  as  procreation,  education,  and  the  administra- 
tion of  justice  should  be  so  largely  committed  to  the  will  and 
power  of  man  ?  These  great  things  are  in  our  hands,  that  we 
should  learn  to  realize  both  our  dependence  and  our  responsi- 
bility. 

What  about  those  who  have  practically  none  to  pray  for  them, 
or  to  pray  for  them  in  particular  ?  What  of  those  for  whom  we 
should  have  prayed  and  have  neglected  to  do  so  or  to  pray  with 
perseverance  and  love  ?  Do  they  suffer  loss — unending  loss — 
through  our  neglect  ?  This,  of  course,  is  really  but  one  of  the 
problems  suggested  by  the  consideration  of  what  is  clearly  a  fact 
— the  solidarity  of  the  human  race,  our  dependence  one  upon 
another  in  all  sorts  of  ways  and  for  all  sorts  of  purposes.  As  a 
matter  of  experience,  we  do  suffer  by  reason  of  one  another's 
faults  of  omission,  and  this  not  only  in  lesser  and  external 
matters  but  also  in  the  more  serious  concerns  of  the  moral  and 
spiritual  life.  How  far  such  losses  may  be  irremediable  we  are 
not  told.  The  Judge  of  all  the  earth,  we  know,  will  most 
assuredly  do  right.  He  will  certainly  take  into  consideration  all 
the  circumstances  of  each  individual  soul.  None,  we  may  be 
sure,  will  finally  be  lost  who  has  not  deliberately  and  persistently 
rejected  God.  The  losses  short  of  final  ruin  which  any  may 
suffer  through  others'  failure  to  give  brotherly  help  of  any  kind 
would  suggest  matter  for  self-examination  and  humiliation  before 
God  rather  than  for  speculation  as  to  His  dealings. 


n8      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IT  When  Bacon  fell,  and  when  Andrewes  had  to  sit  in  judg- 
ment upon  the  Lord  Chancellor's  distractingly  sad  case,  he  re- 
membered how  that  great  man  had  been  used  to  call  him  his 
inquisitor,  but  Andrewes  had  secret  remorse  to  the  day  of  his 
death  that  he  had  not  early  enough  and  often  enough  been 
Bacon's  intercessor.^ 

II. 

1.  But  what  is  the  worth  of  intercessory  prayer  ?  Its  worth 
is  manifold,  and,  like  mercy,  "  it  is  twice  bless'd ;  it  blesseth  him 
that  gives  and  him  that  takes  ". 

If  there  be  no  other  result  of  our  prayer,  it  will  certainly 
have  its  effect  in  a  changed  attitude  on  our  own  part.  No  one  can 
pray  honestly  for  another  without  working  for  him,  and  so  help- 
ing to  answer  his  own  prayer.  The  case  of  the  Apostle  Paul  is 
a  conspicuous  example.  Yet  there  is  no  reason  for  confining  the 
influence  of  our  prayers  to  such  reflex  action.  As  the  Father  of 
spirits,  God  has  direct  access  to  the  spirits  of  all  men ;  and  we 
know  not  what  part  in  the  complex  system  of  spiritual  influences 
through  which  His  Kingdom  is  advanced  may  be  played  by  the 
prayers  offered  in  faith  and  love  by  Christians  on  behalf  of  their 
fellows  who  are  in  need.  Here  the  example  of  Jesus  is  full  of 
instruction.  No  one  knew  so  well  as  He  the  loving  purpose  of 
the  Father  towards  His  children  ;  yet  this  did  not  prevent  Him 
from  praying  for  them.  If  we  pray  for  men  in  the  spirit  of 
Jesus,  we  may  be  sure  that  our  prayers  will  not  be  in  vain. 
Intercession  is  love  at  prayer.  Every  true  exercise  of  it  deepens 
our  interest  in  others,  and  develops  in  us  a  sympathy  which  must 
have  its  ultimate  effect  upon  the  happiness  and  well-being  of  the 
world.  As  William  Law  has  said,  "Intercession  is  the  best 
arbitrator  of  all  differences,  the  best  promoter  of  true  friendship, 
the  best  cure  and  preservative  against  all  unkind  tempers,  all 
angry  and  haughty  passions  ".  Besides,  the  interest  in  men  which 
lies  behind  intercessory  prayer  will,  if  it  be  genuine,  also  be 
likely  to  express  itself  practically.  "  He  who  prays  to  God  to 
make  men  happy  will  do  what  he  can  to  make  them  happy  him- 
self." He  will  hope,  bear,  believe,  and  do  all  for  the  man  for 
whom  he  prays ;  and  so  its  influence  upon  himself  in  restraining 

1  A.  Whyte,  Lancelot  Andrewes  and  his  Private  Devotions,  44, 


INTERCESSION  119 

impatient  and  uncharitable  tempers,  and  its  influence,  through 
him  upon  the  world,  will  be  very  great. 

IF  Intercessory  Prayer  is  a  powerful  means  of  grace  to  the 
praying  man.  Martyn  observes  that,  at  times  of  inward  spiritual 
dryness  and  depression,  he  had  often  found  a  delightful  revival 
in  the  act  of  praying  for  others,  for  their  conversion,  or  sanctifica- 
tion,  or  prosperity  in  the  work  of  the  Lord  His  dealings  with 
God  for  them  about  these  gifts  and  blessings  were  for  himself 
the  divinely  natural  channel  of  a  renewed  insight  into  his  own 
part  and  lot  in  Christ,  into  Christ  as  his  own  rest  and  power, 
into  the  "  perfect  freedom  "  of  an  entire  yielding  of  himself  to 
his  Master  for  His  work.^ 

(1)  First  of  all,  in  intercessory  prayer  we  find  an  outlet  for 
those  cares  and  anxieties  which  we  cannot  help  entertaining  with 
regard  to  others — and  often  the  only  outlet.  There  is,  for  instance, 
distance.  He  or  she  in  whom  we  are  interested  may  be  in  another 
hemisphere.  We  cannot  stretch  out  our  hand  to  their  assistance. 
Our  voice  will  not  reach  them.  Any  assistance  we  might  be  able 
to  furnish  them  with  would  be  too  late  ere  it  could  find  them. 
But  we  have  in  intercessory  prayer  a  mode  of  communication 
swifter  than  the  telegraph  or  the  telephone.  God  is  near  to  us, 
and  equally  near  to  them.  We  can  send  them  our  message 
through  Him,  and  that  with  the  certainty  that  no  time  will  be 
lost  on  the  way,  and  that  it  will  infallibly  reach  the  ears  for 
which  it  was  intended. 

Intercession  is  perhaps  the  easiest  branch  of  prayer.  It  is  no 
uncommon  complaint  among  religious  people  that  they  can  pray 
far  more  earnestly  for  others  than  for  themselves.  Many  a  one 
has  been  able  to  pour  out  the  whole  heart  in  an  agony  of  inter- 
cession for  some  beloved  one  in  an  hour  of  danger — a  parent  or 
child,  or  a  brother  or  sister — who  has  been  staggered  and  dis- 
mayed at  the  coldness  and  deadness  of  his  heart  in  his  ordinary 
prayers  for  himself.  This  is,  however,  not  really  a  matter  of 
surprise.  The  fervour  and  intensity  of  the  intercession  is  the 
fruit  of  the  human  love  which  prompts  it.  The  feelings  are 
stirred  in  a  degree  which  is  perhaps  impossible  in  the  more 
purely  spiritual  act  of  the  communing  of  the  soul  with  God  as  to 
its  own  needs  and  condition.     No  doubt  it  is  a  witness  to  the 

1  H.  C.  G.  Moale.  All  in  ChritL  100.     . 


I20      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

infirmity  of  our  fallen  nature  that  our  own  spiritual  wants  stir 
our  feeling  so  languidly.  But  we  must  not  be  cast  down  be- 
cause we  find  that  the  element  of  human  love  can  give  a  life  and 
fervour  to  our  prayers  which  nothing  else  can.  It  is  probably  a 
necessity  of  our  present  state  that  it  should  be  so.  And  if  such 
is  our  own  experience,  we  should  simply  bow  our  heads,  and 
confess  with  shame  how  little  our  own  soul's  needs  affect  us, 
thanking  God  that  He  has  shown  us  what  true  fervent  prayer 
may  be,  and  asking  Him  to  pardon  the  lack  of  warmth  we  mourn 
over  in  our  devotions,  and  to  accept  them  for  Jesus  Christ's  sake. 
After  all,  love  is  a  grace  which  is  of  God,  who  "  is  Love,"  and  He 
who  has  planted  this  fair  plant  of  love  in  our  hearts  will  not 
scorn  the  prayer  to  which  it  lends  its  fragrance. 

(2)  Not  only  so,  but  as  the  habit  of  praise  intensifies  our 
love  of  God,  so  the  habit  of  intercession  intensifies  our  love  of 
man.  The  more  we  pray  for  our  fellow-men,  the  more  inevitably 
we  yearn  to  help  them ;  and  this  yearning  quickens  our  energies 
and  enlarges  our  capacities  for  helpfulness  in  a  way  and  to  an 
extent  that  we  cannot  fail  to  recognize  as  part  of  the  answer  to 
our  prayer. 

(3)  Intercession  for  others  is  often  the  easiest  way  to  break 
up  the  stupor,  the  insensibility,  of  our  own  hearts.  We  are 
not  always  in  the  spirit  of  prayer.  Sometimes  the  wheels 
drag  heavily,  and  it  is  a  labour  and  a  task.  Let  us,  how- 
ever, only  turn  aside  from  the  consideration  of  our  own  wants 
and  desires,  and  contemplate  the  necessities  of  others  and  pour 
out  our  supplications  for  them,  and  the  soul  will  awake  from  its 
torpor ;  faith  will  find  its  wings,  and  will  soar  joyfully  towards 
God.  That  which  cramps  the  soul  and  drags  it  to  the  earth  is  its 
selfishness.  Now  selfishness  is  both  unhappiness  and  feebleness. 
Let  selfishness  depart,  and  the  heart  glows  with  a  generous 
afiection,  and  the  spirit  is  stronger  to  grasp  for  another  than 
when  it  grasps  for  itself.  When  intercession  is  Divinely  inspired 
and  controlled,  and  directed  towards  those  ready  to  benefit  by  it, 
it  will  naturally  be  free  from  all  taint  of  selfishness,  and  will  be 
prompted  purely  by  the  love  of  souls  and  a  desire  for  God's 
glory.  Where  our  own  interests  or  our  happiness  in  life  is 
involved  by  the  actions  of  others,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  there  is  a 
danger  of  our  being  actuated  in  our  prayers  for  these  by  the 


INTERCESSION  121 

desire  to  escape  from  annoyance  or  actual  suffering  and  distress, 
and  he  would  be  a  harsh  critic  who  stigmatized  such  prayers  as 
selfish  in  their  character.  Still,  it  is  possible,  no  doubt,  that  in 
offering  such  prayers  we  may  be  thinking  more  of  the  relief  that 
a  favourable  answer  might  bring  to  us  than  of  the  value  of  the 
human  soul  for  which  we  pray,  or  of  the  advancement  of  the 
Kingdom  of  Christ. 

IT  In  the  life  of  Frank  Crossley  it  is  told  how  one  day  in 
1888  he  had  said  good-bye  at  the  station  to  his  friends,  General 
and  Mrs.  Booth ;  but  before  they  steamed  out  he  handed  a  letter 
to  them  giving  details  of  a  sacrifice  he  had  resolved  to  make  for 
the  Army.  He  came  home,  and  was  praying  alone.  "  As  I  was 
praying,"  he  said,  "  there  came  over  me  the  most  extraordinary 
sense  of  joy.  It  was  not  exactly  in  my  head,  nor  in  my  heart, 
it  was  almost  a  grasping  of  my  chest  by  some  strange  hand,  that 
filled  me  with  an  ecstasy  I  never  had  before.  It  was  borne  in  on 
me  that  this  was  the  joy  of  the  Lord."  So  this  servant  of  God 
made  in  his  pilgrimage  to  God  an  advance  from  which  he  never 
fell  back.  He  thought  it  likely  at  the  time  that  the  Booths  had 
read  this  letter  in  the  train  and  this  was  an  answer  to  prayer  of 
theirs;  afterwards  he  heard  they  had  'prayed  for  him  in  the 
train  just  after  getting  well  out  of  Manchester.^ 

(4)  Intercession  brings  with  it  one  further  result.  Our  moral 
rights  over  men,  our  influence,  our  power,  if  need  be,  to  rebuke, 
our  power  to  guide  and  teach  and  help,  depend  on  our  inter- 
cession on  their  behalf.  Amos  the  prophet,  taken  "  from  follow- 
ing the  flock,"  goes  forth  in  quiet  confidence  on  his  mission  of 
judgment  and  restoration,  but  he  has  prayed  first  of  all  that  the 
threatened  judgment  may  be  turned  away :  "  O  Lord  God,  forgive, 
I  beseech  thee  :  how  shall  Jacob  stand  ?  for  he  is  small ".  With 
his  fellow-countrymen  Amos  suflers  the  agony  of  the  judgment 
which  it  is  his  duty,  as  a  prophet,  to  proclaim.  And  it  is  only 
when  we  have  thus  entreated  for  men,  when  we  have  represented 
them  before  the  throne,  when  we  come  forth  from  intercession 
at  the  mercy-seat,  that  we  can  exercise  over  them  the  moral  rights 
with  which  we  are  entrusted. 

IF  It  was  a  remark  of  General  Gordon's  that  it  makes  a  great 
difference  in  our  feeling  towards  a  stranger  if  before  we  meet 
him  we  have  prayed  for  him.     And  we  may  with  equal  truth 

J  Edward  Shillito,  Looking  Inwards^  61. 


122      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

say  that  it  makes  a  great  difference  in  the  feelings  of  others 
towards  us  if  they  have  reason  to  believe  that  we  have  prayed 
for  them.  St.  Paul,  therefore,  gives  himself  this  advantage.  He 
says,  **  God  is  my  witness,  whom  I  serve  in  my  spirit  in  the 
gospel  of  his  Son,  how  unceasingly  I  make  mention  of  you,  always 
in  my  prayers  ".  Then  he  goes  on  to  tell  them  that  he  not  only 
prays  for  their  welfare,  but  prays  that  he  may  have  the  ad- 
vantage of  seeing  them  face  to  face  and  knowing  them.  And 
here  he  puts  his  desire  to  see  them  on  the  true  ground.  He 
wants  to  visit  them  because  he  has  something  of  the  utmost  value 
to  give  them — that  he  may  "impart  unto  them  some  spiritual 

gift".' 

IT  If  you  should  always  change  and  alter  your  intercessions 
according  as  the  needs  and  necessities  of  your  neighbours  or 
acquaintance  seem  to  require,  beseeching  God  to  deliver  them 
from  such  and  such  particular  evils,  or  to  grant  them  this  or  that 
particular  gift  or  blessing,  such  intercessions,  besides  the  great 
charity  of  them,  would  have  a  mighty  effect  upon  your  own  heart, 
as  disposing  you  to  every  other  good  oflfice,  and  to  the  exercise  of 
every  other  virtue  towards  such  persons  as  have  so  often  a  place 
in  your  prayers.  This  would  make  it  pleasant  to  you  to  be 
courteous,  civil,  and  condescending  to  all  about  you,  and  make 
you  unable  to  say  or  do  a  rude  or  hard  thing  to  those  for  whom 
you  had  used  yourself  to  be  so  kind  and  compassionate  in  your 
prayers.  For  there  is  nothing  that  makes  us  love  a  man  so  much 
as  praying  for  him  ;  and  when  you  can  once  do  this  sincerely  for 
any  man  you  have  fitted  your  soul  for  the  performance  of  every- 
thing that  is  kind  and  civil  towards  him.  This  will  fill  your 
heart  with  a  generosity  and  tenderness  that  will  give  you  a  better 
and  sweeter  behaviour  than  anything  that  is  called  fine  breeding 
and  good  manners.  By  considering  yourself  as  an  advocate  with 
God  for  your  neighbours  and  acquaintance  you  would  never  find 
it  hard  to  be  at  peace  with  them  yourself.  It  would  be  easy  to 
you  to  bear  with  and  forgive  those  for  whom  you  particularly 
implored  the  Divine  mercy  and  forgiveness.  Such  prayers  as 
these  amongst  neighbours  and  acquaintance  would  unite  them  to 
one  another  in  the  strongest  bonds  of  love  and  tenderness.  It 
would  exalt  and  ennoble  their  souls,  and  teach  them  to  consider 
one  another  in  a  higher  state,  as  members  of  a  spiritual  society, 
that  are  created  for  the  enjoyment  of  the  common  blessings  of 
God,  and  fellow-heirs  of  the  same  future  glory.^ 

1  Bishop  Gore,  St.  Paul's  Epistle  te  the  Romans^  i.  54. 
^  William  Law,  A  Serious  Call,  chap.  xxi. 


INTERCESSION  123 

2.  It  is  hard  to  conceive  of  an  influence  more  likely  to  pre- 
serve in  temptation  and  to  strengthen  for  duty  than  the  knowledge 
that  prayers  are  offered  on  our  behalf,  or  even  the  memory  of 
prayers  once  offered.  The  voices,  some  hushed,  that  once  pleaded 
with  God  for  us — voices  of  father  or  mother  or  some  faithful 
friend — plead  with  us  still,  and  it  is  hard  to  resist  such  a  plea. 
It  can  awaken  old  and  blessed  memories,  stir  a  long-slumbering 
conscience,  stifle  the  incipient  passion,  quicken  the  better  nature, 
brace,  strengthen,  and  purify.  Jesus  interceded  for  Peter  that  his 
faith  should  not  fail,  and,  in  a  crucial  moment,  it  failed  :  he  denied 
and  cursed  and  swore.  Nevertheless  the  prayer  bore  fruit ;  for 
afterwards  he  wept  bitterly  and  became  one  of  the  Master's 
mightiest  servants.     Verily  great  is  the  power  of  intercession. 

Oh,  if  our  ears  were  opened 

To  hear  as  angels  do 
The  Intercession- chorus 

Arising  full  and  true. 
We  should  hear  it  soft  up- welling 

In  morning's  pearly  light, 
Through  evening's  shadows  swelling 

In  grandly  gathering  might, 
The  sultry  silence  filling 

Of  noontide's  thunderous  glow. 
And  the  solemn  starlight  thrilling 

With  ever-deepening  flow. 

We  should  hear  it  through  the  rushing 

Of  the  city's  restless  roar, 
And  trace  its  gentle  gushing 

O'er  ocean's  crystal  floor ; 
We  should  hear  it  far  up-floating 

Beneath  the  Orient  moon, 
And  catch  the  golden  noting 

From  the  busy  Western  noon, 
And  pine-robed  heights  would  echo 

As  the  mystic  chant  up-floats. 
And  the  sunny  plain  resound  again 

With  the  myriad -mingling  notes. 

There  are  hands  too  often  weary 

With  the  business  of  the  day. 
With  God-entrusted  duties. 

Who  are  toiling  while  they  pray. 


124      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

They  bear  the  golden  vials, 

And  the  golden  harps  of  praise, 
Through  all  the  daily  trials. 

Through  all  the  dusty  ways. 
These  hands,  so  tired,  so  faithful, 

With  odours  sweet  are  filled, 
And  in  the  ministry  of  prayer 

Are  wonderfully  skilled. 

There  are  noble  Christian  workers 

The  men  of  faith  and  power. 
The  overcoming  wrestlers 

Of  many  a  midnight  hour ; 
Prevailing  princes  with  their  God, 

Who  will  not  be  denied, 
Who  bring  down  showers  of  blessing 

To  swell  the  rising  tide. 
The  Prince  of  Darkness  quaileth 

At  their  triumphant  way, 
Their  fervent  prayer  availeth 

To  sap  his  subtle  sway. 

And  evermore  the  Father 

Sends  radiantly  down 
All-marvellous  responses, 

His  ministers  to  crown  ; 
The  incense-doud  returning 

As  golden  blessing-showers. 
We  in  each  drop  discerning 

Some  feeble  prayer  of  ours. 
Transmuted  into  wealth  unpriced. 

By  Him  who  giveth  thus 
The  glory  all  to  Jesus  Christ, 

The  gladness  all  to  us  !  ^ 

(1)  Intercessory  prayer  presents  to  us  one  of  the  profoundest 
mysteries  of  the  spiritual  life.  Our  character  and  destiny  are 
open  to  the  influence  of  the  prayers  of  others,  as  theirs  are  to 
ours.  At  first  sight  it  is  an  appalling  thought  that  we  should  be 
exposed  to  the  prayer-influence  of  our  short-sighted  fellow-crea- 
tures ;  that  their  prayers  should  be  capable  of  giving  new  form 
and  direction  to  our  lives,  and  that  we  likewise  should  have  such 

1  Franots  Bidley  Havergal. 


INTERCESSION 


"5 


influence  by  prayer  over  them.  It  is  thus  we  are  beset  before 
and  behind  by  unseen  powers,  whose  action  we  cannot  prognosti- 
cate or  control,  and  life  passes  largely  into  the  hands  of  others. 
This  may  be  accepted  as  part  of  the  Divine  order.  Prayer  can 
never  be  confined  to  petitions  for  the  desires  of  self;  and  im- 
mediately it  passes  beyond,  it  becomes  intercession,  and  interces- 
sion from  its  very  nature  ceases  to  be  prayer  if  faith  in  its  efficacy 
be  evacuated  by  the  suspicion  that  those  for  whom  we  pray  are 
not  affected  by  God  through  our  prayers.  The  great  intercessory 
prayer  of  Jesus  for  His  disciples  and  for  the  world  would  lose  its 
significance  if  prayer  made  no  change  in  their  or  the  world's  con- 
dition.    It  would  be  nothing  more  than  a  pious  delusion. 

IF  No  one  can  visit  a  children's  hospital  without  seeing  in  the 
most  touching  form  that  the  sins  of  the  fathers  are  visited  on  the 
children.  Some  people  seem  to  imagine  that  that  saying  in  the 
Bible  is  an  arbitrary  command  imposing  an  arbitrary  punishment 
on  the  human  race  ;  but  one  hour  spent  in  that  children's  hospital 
will  show  that  it  simply  states  a  fact  of  human  nature.  As  you 
see  the  poor  little  child  die  in  front  of  you  for  no  fault  of  its  own, 
as  you  see  the  illness  brought  on  it  by  its  father's  sins  kill  it 
before  your  eyes,  you  see,  in  a  way  which  you  will  never  forget 
and  can  never  efiace  from  your  mind,  that  God  has  disallowed 
the  claim  of  the  individual  man  to  stand  on  his  own  base.  He 
shows  us  that  He  has  bound  us  together  by  such  ties  of  brother- 
hood that  no  man  can  live  to  himself,  and  no  man  can  die  to  him- 
self. It  is  a  monstrous  injustice  that  that  little  one  should  die 
for  the  sins  of  its  parents,  unless  in  the  brotherhood  of  man,  in 
the  solidarity  of  humanity,  God  was  preparing  some  better  thing 
for  us  which  more  than  counterbalanced  the  terrible  mischief 
which  comes  from  it.  And  in  intercession,  in  the  death  of  Christ 
upon  the  cross,  and  His  ceaseless  intercession,  we  see  what  the 
good  was.  If  a  man  claims  to  stand  on  his  own  base,  then  he 
must  give  up  speaking  of  being  saved  by  Jesus  Christ.  It  is  be- 
cause we  are  a  brotherhood  that  we  can  be  saved  by  Another. 
And  we  see  that  God's  great  plan  was  this :  to  send  through  the 
channels  of  brotherhood  the  freshening,  reviving  grace  to  press 
back  that  poisonous  mischief  which  had  come  through  the  same 
channels.  And  it  is  a  man's  sense  of  fairness,  his  belief  in  the 
justice  of  God,  that  makes  him  believe  that,  if  mischief  comes 
through  the  brotherhood  to  one  another,  then  intercession,  joined 
to  the  intercession  of  Jesus  Christ,  is  one  of  the  means  by  which 
the  influence  of  others  can  tell  upon  the  human  race.^ 

^  A.  F.  W.  Ingram,  Banners  of  the  Christian  Faith,  78. 


126      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

(2)  Intercession  is  apt  at  first  sight  to  seem  more  mysterious 
than  other  prayer,  because,  while  we  can  readily  understand 
that  the  co-operation  of  each  man's  own  free-will  is  an  essential 
condition  of  his  personal  ability  to  receive  grace  from  God,  it  is 
not  so  easy  to  conceive  how  or  why  the  action  of  one  man's  free- 
will should  influence  God's  blessing  of  another.  But  mysterious 
though  the  subject  is,  there  are  analogies  that  at  least  throw 
light  upon  it.  For  it  is  a  fact  of  experience  that  God's  govern- 
ment of  man  is  partly  effected  through  human  mediation.  The 
man  who  uses  his  faculties  and  capacities  aright  thereby  helps 
his  fellow-men  ;  while  the  man  who  misuses  them  deprives  his 
fellow-men  of  the  help  that  they  might  otherwise  have  had. 
Nor  does  this  hold  good  only  in  secular  affairs  ;  on  the  contrary, 
it  is  nowhere  more  apparent  than  in  spiritual  things.  The  pro- 
phet, preacher,  teacher,  artist  who  "  stirs  up^  the  gift  that  is  in 
him "  advances  the  spiritual  life  of  his  fellows  by  the  fact ; 
while  the  man  who  might  have  been  such  an  one,  yet  wraps  his 
talent  in  a  napkin,  leaves  his  fellows  spiritually  the  poorer.  And 
God  allows  it  to  be  so.  If,  then,  prayer  be  the  powerful  force 
which  we  believe  it  to  be,  its  intercessory  operation  would  be 
strictly  analogous  to  the  other  actions  of  human  free-will,  and  the 
use  of  it  a  part  of  that  general  responsibility  which  our  freedom 
entails. 

H  Such  is  the  love  of  God  towards  us,  such  the  dignity  which 
He  bestows  upon  us,  to  be  co-operators  with  Himself,  that  man's 
fervent  cry  for  others  who  never  pray  for  themselves,  inspired 
by  Himself,  upheld  by  His  own  grace  of  "  hope  against  hope," 
obtains  that  last  first  grace  which  won  the  hitherto  obdurate 
rebel  to  Himself.  God's  word  guarantees  this,  when  it  bids  us 
pray  '*  for  all  men,"  because  God  "  will  have  all  men  to  be  saved  ". 
God's  word  is  justified  in  act  by  the  known  instances  of  those 
whose  souls  He  has  saved  through  prayers  which  He  Himself  in- 
spired. Witness  he,  the  great  teacher  of  the  Church  till  now,  of 
whom,  though  unknown  in  the  flesh  and  known  only  through 
the  eminence  of  his  rebellion,  it  was  said  :  "  it  is  not  possible 
that  the  son  of  those  tears  should  perish  "  ;  who  himself,  when 
converted,  owned  himself  to  be  the  fruit  of  those  nine  years'  un- 
broken, unfaltering  prayers  of  his  mother  St.  Monica,  who  lived 
for  his  conversion  and,  when  this  object  of  her  being  was  accom- 
plished, yielded  up  her  own  soul  to  God.^ 

^  E.  B.  PaBey,  Occasional  Sermons,  298. 


INTERCESSION  127 

IT  I  remember  speaking  in  the  Boston  noonday  meeting,  in  the 
old  Broomfield  Street  M.  E.  Church  on  this  subject  one  week. 
Perhaps  I  was  speaking  rather  positively.  And  at  the  close  of 
the  meeting  one  day  a  keen,  cultured  Christian  woman  whom  I 
knew  came  up  for  a  word.  She  said,  "  I  do  not  think  we  can 
pray  like  that".  And  I  said,  "  Why  not  ?"  She  paused  a  mo- 
ment, and  her  well-controlled  agitation  revealed  in  eye  and  lip 
told  me  how  deeply  her  thoughts  were  stirred.  Then  she  said 
quietly  "  I  have  a  brother.  He  is  not  a  Christian.  The  theatre, 
the  wine,  the  club,  the  cards — that  is  his  life.  And  he  laughs  at 
me.  I  would  rather  than  anything  else  that  my  brother  were  a 
Christian.  But,"  she  said,  and  here  both  her  keenness  and  the 
training  of  her  early  teaching  came  in,  "I  do  not  think  I  can 
pray  positively  for  his  conversion,  for  he  is  a  free  agent,  is  he 
not  ?  And  God  will  not  save  a  man  against  his  will."  I  said  to 
her :  "  Man  is  a  free  agent,  to  use  the  old  phrase,  so  far  as  God  is 
concerned ;  utterly,  wholly  free.  And  he  is  the  most  enslaved 
agent  on  the  earth,  so  far  as  sin  and  selfishness  and  prejudice  are 
concerned.  The  purpose  of  our  praying  is  not  to  force  or  coerce 
his  will ;  never  that.  It  is  to  free  his  will  of  the  warping  influ- 
ences that  now  twist  it  awry.  It  is  to  get  the  dust  out  of  his 
eyes  so  that  his  sight  shall  be  clear.  And  once  he  is  free,  able  to 
see  aright,  to  balance  things  without  prejudice,  the  whole  proba- 
bility is  in  favour  of  his  using  his  will  to  choose  the  only  right."  ^ 

(3)  Unless  we  are  dogmatically  determined  to  reject  all  testi- 
mony which  bears  on  this  subject,  there  seems  no  escaping  the 
conclusion  that  specific  prayers  have  been  specifically,  directly, 
and  unmistakably  answered  in  instances  too  numerous  to  admit 
of  explanation  by  coincidence.  The  volume  of  human  testimony 
bearing  on  this  subject  is  too  great  to  be  swept  aside  by  a  simple 
refusal  to  consider  it ;  if  there  is  no  insurmountable  logical 
obstacle  to  the  possibility  of  prayer  proving  objectively  effective 
— and  we  have  tried  to  show  that  there  are  no  such  obstacles — 
we  must  examine  the  alleged  instances  of  such  answers  without 
prejudice  ;  and  if  we  do  so,  then,  after  making  all  legitimate  de- 
ductions, we  shall  still  find  a  body  of  residual  fact  which  is  not 
to  be  explained  away. 

He  who  prays  much  for  individuals  and  keeps  a  record  of 
intercession  has  a  vast  accumulation  of  evidence  that  for  affecting 
others  nothing  we  do  is  so  potent  as  prayer.  The  hidden  lines 
of  communication  running  between  soul  and  soul  are  insufficiently 

^  S.  D.  Gordon,  Quiet  Talks  on  Prayer,  192. 


128      CHRISTIAN.  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

explored.  But  telepathy  is  a  convenient  name  for  a  fact  which 
every  intercessor  has  frequently  experienced  It  seems  as  if 
something  of  this  kind  happens :  when  you  begin  to  pray,  you 
get  quickly  on  to  a  plane  of  being  where  distance  does  not  count ; 
you  are  at  once  by  the  side  of  the  person  you  pray  for,  in  the 
next  room  or  on  the  other  side  of  the  globe.  But  your  influence 
on  the  person  in  that  region  of  experience  is  much  more  powerful 
than  it  is  in  the  more  superficial  intercourse  of  early  life.  You 
reach  the  soul.  And  you  bring  with  you  co-operant  forces.  To 
your  amazement  you  find  afterwards  that  your  prayer  has  brought 
miraculously,  as  it  seems,  comfort  and  strength ;  it  has  stirred 
the  will,  at  that  distance,  to  act ;  it  has  set  in  motion  helpers  or 
directors  who  come  to  the  aid  of  the  distracted  or  the  suffering 
or  the  sinful. 

IF  Some  close  observers  of  the  Lord's  ways  have  recorded  it  as 
their  experience  that  their  intercessory  prayers  have  been  answered 
more  distinctly  and  palpably  than  their  prayers  for  themselves.^ 

IT  You  never  know  where  a  prayer's  power  will  land — in  a 
human  heart  that  needs  it,  or  with  God  who  hears  it.  Norman 
Macleod  tells  of  a  boy's  cry  to  Heaven  for  the  sake  of  a  drunken 
man  who  used  to  come  to  see  him  as  he  lay  sick  and  dying. 
When  he  had  drink,  he  used  to  pass  the  door  softly,  ashamed  to 
look  the  little  one  in  the  face.  But  one  night  he  heard  the  thin 
voice  beating  at  Heaven's  door  with  its  cry,  *'  Oh,  Father !  don't 
let  him  be  drunken  any  more,  he  is  so  good  and  kind,  and  I  love 
him  ".  The  strong  man  listened,  caught  at  the  heart,  and  when 
he  entered  he  went  down  upon  his  knees  beside  the  dying  child, 
and  said  through  big,  bitter  tears,  "  Were  you  praying  for  a  waif 
like  me?"  "Yes,"  said  the  boy,  "I  was  praying  for  you.  I 
aye  do  that.  You're  no  a  waif" — he  didn't  know  the  word — 
"  you're  a  man."  Many  a  night,  as  he  drove  his  cab  along  the 
weary  streets,  out  of  the  grave  came  that  pinched  face,  lit  by  love, 
to  his  heart,  and  the  haunting,  "  You're  no  a  waif,  you're  a  man,'* 
made  him  at  last  stand  firm,  rooted  in  manhood  through  a  child's 
weak  dying  prayer,  heard  in  a  city  stair  by  night.  ^ 

^  I  have  myself  experienced  what  is  recorded  of  Spurgeon, 
though  I  prefer  to  hint  at  the  fact  as  it  is  recorded  by  him.  There 
came  into  his  vestry  a  woman  who  had  believed  in  Christ,  but 
the  trouble  was  the  indifference  or  unbelief  of  her  husband. 
Spurgeon  without   a  moment's   hesitation   proposed   that  they 

^  W.  Binnie,  Sermons,  117.  ^h.  Maclean  Watt,  Ood's  Altar  Stairs,  9. 


INTERCESSION  129 

should  pray  for  him.  They  knelt  down  and  asked  that  he  might 
seek  Christ  and  be  saved.  As  they  prayed  in  the  vestry,  the 
man  was  reached  in  his  home.  When  the  woman  returned  she 
found  her  husband  seeking  salvation.^ 

IF  Some  years  ago,  the  record  of  a  wonderful  work  of  grace  in 
connexion  with  one  of  the  stations  of  the  China  Inland  Mission 
attracted  a  good  deal  of  attention.  Both  the  number  and  spiritual 
character  of  the  converts  had  been  far  greater  than  at  other 
stations  where  the  consecration  of  the  missionaries  had  been  just 
as  great  as  at  the  more  fruitful  place.  This  rich  harvest  of  souls 
remained  a  mystery  until  Hudson  Taylor  on  a  visit  to  England 
discovered  the  secret.  At  the  close  of  one  of  his  addresses  a 
gentleman  came  forward  to  make  his  acquaintance.  In  the  con- 
versation which  followed,  Mr.  Taylor  was  surprised  at  the 
accurate  knowledge  the  man  possessed  concerning  this  Inland 
China  Station.  "But  how  is  it,"  Mr.  Taylor  asked,  ''that  you 
are  so  conversant  with  the  conditions  of  that  work  ?  "  "  Oh  !  " 
he  replied,  "  the  missionary  there  and  I  are  old  college  mates ;  for 
years  we  have  regularly  corresponded ;  he  has  sent  me  names  of 
enquirers  and  converts,  and  these  I  have  daily  taken  to  God  in 
prayer."  At  last  the  secret  was  found !  A  praying  man  at 
home,  praying  definitely,  praying  daily,  for  specific  cases  among 
the  heathen.     That  is  the  real  intercessory  missionary.  2 

IF  As  for  myself  I  do  esteem  nothing  out  of  Heaven,  and  next 
to  a  communion  with  Jesus  Christ,  more  than  to  be  in  the  hearts 
and  prayers  of  the  saints.^ 

IT  And  as  for  ourselves,  may  we  not  more  and  more  rejoice  to 
be  borne  onward  by  the  arm  of  Christ  ?  Time  was  when  we 
girded  ourselves ;  but  one  day  we  shall  submit  with  joy  to  be 
girded  by  Another.  Once  we  were  proud  to  choose  our  way ; 
then  it  will  be  our  one  desire  that  He  will  keep  our  feet  from 
straying.     And  at  last  we  shall  cry  in  our  weariness — 

Carry  me  over  the  long  last  mile, 
Man  of  Nazareth,  Christ  for  me. 

In  Christ  we  shall  know  that  there  meet,  fused  in  one  awful 
energy  of  love,  all  that  we  have  ever  prayed  ourselves,  all  that 
others  have  prayed  for  us  during  the  long  years  of  life,  all  the 
prayers  of  the  dead  and  of  the  living,  and  the  eternal  intercessions 
of  Him  who  loved  us  even  until  death.  All  are  answered  in  the 
Unseen  Arm  that  upholds  us — in  the  pierced  hands  "  which  are 
lifting  us  over  the  ford  ".^ 

1  R.  F.  Horton,  My  Belief,  186.  2  jj.  M.  Bounds,  Purpos6  in  Prayer,  130. 

3  Letters  of  Samuel  Rutherford.  •*  Edward  Shillito,  Looking  Inwards,  53. 

9 


VII. 

Thanksgiving. 


Literature. 

Clifford,  J.,  The  Gospel  of  Gladness  (1912). 

Conway,  S.,  in  The  Pulpit  Commentary  :  Psalms,  ii.  (1896). 

Gottschick,  J.,  Ethik  (1907). 

Hamilton,  J.,  The  Mount  of  Olives  (1846). 

Home,  C.  S.,  The  Life  that  is  Easy  (1896). 

Jenkins,  E.  E.,  Life  and  Christ  (1896). 

Jowebt,  J.  H.,  The  High  Calling  (1909). 

King,  E.,  Sermons  and  Addresses  (1911). 

McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The' Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 

Monrad,  D.  G.,  The  World  of  Prayer  (1879). 

Moore,  E.W.,  The  Christ-Controlled  Life  (1894). 

Roberts,  J,  E.,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions  (1908). 

Rossetti,  C.  G.,  The  Face  of  the  Deep  (1892). 

Schlatter,  A.,  Das  Christliche  Dogma  (1911). 

Shelford,  L.  E.,  By  Way  of  Remembrance  (1893). 

Smith,  D.,  The  Feast  of  the  Covenant. 

Sowter,  G.  A.,  Trial  and  Triumph  (1910). 

Thomas,  W.  H.  G.,  Life  Abiding  and  Abounding. 

Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 

Harvard  Theological  Review,  iy.  (1911)  489  (M.  W.  Calkins), 


X3« 


Thanksgiving. 

Adoration  is  devout  meditation  on  what  Jehovah  is — the  praise 
of  the  Divine  perfections.  Thanksgiving  is  delighted  meditation 
on  what  the  Lord  has  done  for  us  or  others — praise  for  His 
mercies.  Such  praise  is  "  comely".  Just  as  there  is  meanness  in 
constant  murmuring,  so  there  is  a  gracefulness  and  a  majesty  in 
habitual  gratitude.  And  it  is  "  pleasant ".  It  is  not  the  full 
purse  or  the  easy  calling,  but  the  full  heart,  the  praising  disposi- 
tion, that  makes  the  blessed  life  ;  and,  of  all  personal  gifts,  that 
man  has  got  the  best  who  has  received  the  quick-discerning  eye, 
the  promptly-joyful  soul,  the  ever-praising  spirit. 

Prayers  of  thanksgiving,  however  superficially  related  to 
prayers  of  adoration,  yet  differ  from  them  in  requiring  a  less  ex- 
clusive absorption  in  God,  in  starting  from  the  sense  of  human 
satisfaction,  human  delight,  which  is  then  attributed  to  God  as 
cause  :  "  Oh  that  men  would  praise  the  Lord,"  cries  the  Psalmist, 
"  for  his  goodness,  and  for  his  wonderful  works  to  the  children 
of  men".  Prayers  of  thanksgiving  belong  to  very  primitive 
peoples ;  and  in  sacrifice  one  often  finds  concrete  expression  of 
gratitude.  Such  sacrifices,  exemplified  by  first-fruits,  ceremonials, 
and  burnt-offerings,  are  most  often  accompanied  by  verbal  ex- 
pressions. "  Even  the  savage,"  Jevons  asserts,  "  who  simply 
says  *  Here,  Tari,  I  have  brought  you  something  to  eat,'  is  ex- 
pressing thanks,  albeit  in  savage  fashion."  ^ 

IT  It  is  unfortunately  too  true  that  prayer  is  most  commonly 
associated  with  the  idea  of  getting  something  ;  whereas  thanks- 
giving, as  its  name  betrays,  means  the  giving  of  something — it  is 
an  act  of  sacrifice.  It  is  indeed  a  sad  consideration  how  few  are 
"  found  to  give  glory  to  God  "  among  all  the  recipients  of  His 
grace.  Thanksgiving,  one  would  suppose,  would  be  spontaneous 
and  inevitable. 

I  do  but  sing  because  I  must, 

1  M.  W.  Calkins,  in  The  Harvard  Theological  Review,  iv.  493. 
133 


134      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

said  Tennyson.  But  how  few  Christians  manifest  the  spontaneity 
of  the  linnet's  song,  and  sing  because  they  must.  How  few  ever 
have  a  heart  so  bursting  with  grateful  emotion  that  they  must 
withdraw  to  some  solitude  where  their  tears  of  praise  may  over- 
flow, and  their  swelling  gratitude  find  relief  in  adoration  and 
thanksgiving.^ 

I. 

1.  Thanksgiving  is  a  necessary  part  of  every  complete  prayer, 
as  necessary  as  supplication.  It  is  the  sign  that  the  prayer  is  in 
faith.  For  it  is  not  enough  to  ask  ;  we  must  also  believe  that  we 
have  received.  Thanksgiving  is  the  acknowledgment  that  our 
prayer  has  been  answered  and  that  we  have  received  that  which 
we  asked.  If  we  look  at  St.  Paul's  Epistles,  we  frequently  find 
petition  mentioned  with  thanksgiving  accompanying  it.  "  In 
everything  by  prayer  and  supplication  with  thanksgiving  let  your 
requests  be  made  known  unto  God  "  (Phil.  iv.  6).  It  is  probably 
intended  to  suggest  the  attitude  of  appropriation  as  well  as  of 
supplication.  Prayer  is  asking  ;  thanksgiving  is  testifying  that 
we  have  received.  It  is  just  here  that  we  fail ;  we  ask,  but  we 
do  not  accept  and  appropriate.  Faith  in  Scripture  is  twofold  in 
meaning.  There  is  the  faith  that  asks  and  the  faith  that  accepts. 
The  faith  that  asks  is  expressed  in  petition  ;  the  faith  that  accepts 
is  expressed  in  thanksgiving.  We  are  continually  asking,  but 
have  we  the  faith  that  appropriates  ?  A  Christian  man  went  to 
lunch  with  an  intimate  friend  whom  he  had  known  for  twenty- 
five  years,  and  after  "  grace  "  was  said,  the  ordinary  phrase  being 
used,  asking  to  be  ''  made  truly  thankful,"  the  guest,  claiming  the 
privilege  of  friendship,  inquired,  "  When  do  you  expect  to  get 
that  prayer  answered  ?  You  have  been  praying  all  these  years 
to  be  made  thankful !  "  The  man  had  been  "  asking,"  but  never 
appropriating.  He  had  the  faith  that  asks,  but  not  the  faith  that 
accepts.  Many  a  Christian  would  find  life  more  powerful  and 
blessed  if  he  knew  a  little  more  of  the  faith  that  appropriates, 
faith  that  expresses  itself  in  thanksgiving,  "  O  God,  I  thank 
Thee  ! "  We  may  see  this  in  the  Revised  Version  of  Mark  xi. 
24,  "  All  things  whatsoever  ye  pray  and  ask  for,  believe  that  ye 
have  received  them,  and  ye  shall  have  them  ".  Let  us  not  fail  to 
accompany  our  prayer  with  this  appropriation  of  thanksgiving. 
»  C.  Silvester  Home,  The  Life  that  is  Easy,  147. 


THANKSGIVING  135 

2.  Thanksgiving  supposes  and  includes  everything  which  is 
characteristic  of  godliness. 

(1)  It  is  the  gvxirdian  of  doctrine.  St.  Paul,  in  a  profound 
analysis  of  the  decline  of  faith,  makes  the  first  step  of  that 
decline  unthankfulness.  When  men  knew  God,  "  they  glorified 
him  not  as  God,  neither  were  thankful  "  (Rom.  i.  21).  When 
they  ceased  to  acknowledge  God,  He  was  gradually  expelled  from 
their  thoughts,  and  soon  disappeared  from  their  creed.  Atheism 
and  idolatry  are  not  intellectually  attained ;  a  man  never  reasons 
himself  into  these  positions ;  they  are  the  necessary  result  of 
spiritual  insensibility.  It  is  well  for  the  Church  to  guard  her 
doctrines  by  definition,  and  for  the  purposes  of  instruction  and 
unity  to  fix  them  in  formulas  and  catechisms,  but  these  make  a 
frail  defence  where  the  heart  is  not  right  with  God  ;  and  even 
where  these  are  not,  the  faith  is  safely  housed  if  there  be  a 
doxology  in  the  heart.  To  thank  God  is  to  acknowledge  His 
creative  power.  His  supreme  providence,  His  unfailing  bounty, 
and  the  multitude  of  His  tender  mercies.  Thankfulness  is  not  a 
poetical  musing  on  the  Divine  perfections,  but  a  glad  sense  of 
benefits  personally  received,  fixing  the  attention  of  the  mind 
directly  upon  the  Giver,  and  with  such  dispositions  as  insure 
communion  with  the  Giver.  There  will  necessarily  be  prayer 
and  confiding  trust  and  love.  God  will  be  rich  towards  such  a 
mind ;  it  shall  not  be  allowed  to  go  astray. 

(2)  It  is  the  process  of  holiness.  There  may  be  some  diflfer- 
ence  in  our  manner  of  stating  the  doctrine  of  holiness,  but  we 
are  agreed  in  substance  as  to  the  nature  of  holiness.  The  root  of 
holiness  is  consecration  to  God.  This  is  where  it  begins  :  "  Know 
ye  not  that  your  body  is  a  temple  of  the  Holy  Ghost  which- is  in 
you,  which  ye  have  from  God  ?  and  ye  are  not  your  own  ;  for  ye 
were  bought  with  a  price  :  glorify  God  therefore  in  your  body  " 
(1  Cor.  vi.  19,  20).  The  idea  here  is  the  absolute  giving  away  of 
ourselves  to  be  the  possession  of  another.  This  is  the  practical 
acknowledgment  on  our  part  of  the  purchase  by  which  we  cease 
to  belong  to  ourselves.  The  blood  shed  for  us  by  Christ  makes 
us  the  simple  property  of  Christ.  Now  this  act  of  giving  our- 
selves to  God  is  not  a  single  transaction,  a  business  concluded 
once  for  all ;  it  is  living  in  the  spirit  of  consignment.  It  is  only 
by  repeated  acts  of  personal  dedication  that  we  can  maintain  the 


136      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

consciousness  that  we  belong  to  another.  Our  freedom  of  will 
and  the  ordinary  motives  of  our  life  seem  to  proclaim  that  we 
are  our  own  masters,  and  in  the  sense  of  personal  responsibility 
we  are.  In  our  intercourse  with  men  we  govern  ourselves.  The 
faculties  of  self-control  are  never  in  abeyance,  and  unless  we  live 
in  the  spirit  of  consecration  we  soon  cease  to  feel  that  we  are 
bought  with  a  price,  and  the  claims  of  redemption,  if  not  formally 
disputed,  are  like  the  dead  letter  of  a  bond  no  longer  in  force. 

(3)  It  is  the  inspiration  of  union.  The  operation  of  thankful- 
ness in  this  direction  is  seen  at  once  in  that  well-known  passage : 
"Come  and  hear,  all  ye  that  fear  God,  and  I  will  declare  what 
he  hath  done  for  my  soul "  (Ps.  Ixvi.  16).  In  our  notes  of 
triumph,  we  are  not  satisfied  unless  others  share  the  joy.  If  at 
such  seasons  the  heart  could  have  its  way,  if  the  expression  of 
its  gladness  were  not  restricted  by  pride,  fear,  or  expediency,  we 
should  call  together  our  friends  and  neighbours  and  say  unto 
them,  "  Rejoice  with  me  ! "  (Luke  xv.  6).  Their  joy  increases 
ours.  By  a  sympathy  which  is  one  of  the  great  sources  of  human 
strength,  they  make  the  subject  of  our  triumph  their  own.  This 
communion  in  the  property  of  joy  extends  to  the  property  of 
sorrow,  to  the  demands  also  of  work  and  conflict,  and  is  the 
essence  of  Church  union. 

H  Prayer  is  sometimes  exercised  as  a  duty  and  a  task ;  on  its 
supreme  planes  it  is  eagerly  resorted  to  as  a  joy.  A  part  of  the 
true  conception  of  true  intercession  consists  in  giving  pleasure  to 
our  God.  To  supplicate  on  behalf  of  another,  and  to  do  it  with 
the  reluctance  and  misgivings  of  a  bondman,  cannot  be  "  well- 
pleasing  unto  the  Lord".  It  is  our  high  privilege  to  enter  the 
Presence-chamber  like  children  going  home ;  and  to  name  our 
fellow-pilgrims  with  the  happy  assurance  that  the  very  inter- 
cession is  consonant  with  "  the  river  of  God's  pleasures  ".  Thus 
"  the  joy  of  the  Lord  "  will  be  our  strength.  Let  us  ever  suppli- 
cate for  others  as  though  we  had  infinite  resources  in  the  good- 
will of  the  Lord,  and  so  let  us  "  with  joy  draw  water  out  of  the 
wells  of  salvation  ".^ 

II 

1.  No  duty  in  the  life  of  prayer  would  appear  to  be  more  in 
accord  with  man's  true  nature,  none  more  delightful,  than  thanks- 

1  J.  H.  Jowett,  The  High  Calling,  10. 


THANKSGIVING  137 

giving,  and  yet  none  is  so  neglected,  or,  if  recognized,  so  per- 
functory. If  prayers  of  thanksgiving  were  commoner,  the  whole 
life  would  be  indefinitely  enriched.  The  eye  would  ever  be  kept 
awake  and  clear  for  the  hundred  tokens  of  a  Father's  love  that 
fall  unnoticed  about  our  path  every  day,  and  the  heart  would  be 
more  sensitive  and  responsive  to  the  great  salvation.  We  are  far 
enough  yet  from  the  enthusiasm  of  the  New  Testament.  Per- 
haps indeed  that  can  never  be  quite  recalled.  The  men  who  had 
looked  upon  the  face  of  Jesus  or  stood  very  near  Him  in  history, 
and  who  had  literally  seen  the  world  turned  upside  down  by  His 
gospel,  must  have  been  moved,  as  it  is  hardly  possible  for  us  to 
be  moved  who  have  been  born  into  an  atmosphere  more  than 
nominally  Christian — a  world  whose  type  of  civilization  has, 
generally  speaking,  been  created  by  Christianity ;  a  world 
which  is,  indeed,  far  enough  from  being  in  all  its  departments 
controlled  by  the  Christian  spirit,  but  which  nevertheless  can 
show  much  genuinely  Christian  thought,  activity,  and  aspiration. 
It  may  be  that,  in  a  world  so  different,  that  ancient  enthusiasm 
can  never  be  altogether  repeated.  Nevertheless,  the  thanks- 
giving of  the  New  Testament  remains  an  eloquent  rebuke  to  our 
more  sluggish  Christianity,  and  a  standard  to  which  it  must  be 
continually  recalled. 

^  1  have  looked  through  volumes  of  modern  sermons  at  times 
to  gain  inspiration  on  this  theme ;  but  how  seldom  do  we  read 
or  hear  one  on  the  duty  of  thanksgiving.  Our  hymns  are  often 
morbid  and  introspective,  whereas  the  Psalms  are  a  well  of  joyous 
worship,  and  Christ  and  His  Apostles  stand  before  us  as  leaders 
in  a  tribute  to  God's  goodness  and  love.  Again  and  again  have 
I  turned  from  theological  treatises  and  the  ordinary  literature 
of  to-day  to  the  words  of  a  prophet  like  John  Ruskin,  that  I 
might  catch  the  strain  of  a  grateful  heart,  and  learn  anew  that 
the  worship  of  God  is  to  rejoice  in  Him  and  to  swell  the  grand 
chorus  of  praise  which  all  Nature  presents.^ 

2.  Why  is  thanksgiving  neglected  ?  In  the  words  "  forget  not 
all  his  benefits,"  the  Psalmist  of  the  103rd  Psalm  unveils  the  real 
cause.  It  is  simply  the  want  of  recollection,  the  failure  to 
gather  up  all  the  varied  threads  of  the  Divine  grace  and  good- 
ness with  which,  in  all  its  stages  and  under  all  its  conditions, 

1  Leonard  E.  Shelford,  By  Way  of  Remembrance,  96. 


138      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

our  life  is  intertwined.  That  such  forgetfulness  would  certainly 
produce  ingratitude  is  the  theme  of  constant  warning  in  the 
Book  of  Deuteronomy,  penetrated  by  its  all-absorbing  sense  of 
personal  devotion  to  God.  And  the  forgetfulness  is  traced  to  its 
source.  With  prosperity  the  heart  would  be  ''lifted  up,"  and 
dependence  on  the  Divine  Benefactor  would  be  ignored,  if  not 
resented.  In  the  New  Testament,  the  duty  is  no  less  earnestly 
and  constantly  impressed,  although  one  might  have  supposed 
that,  when  the  "  inestimable  love  "  of  God  had  been  revealed  "  in 
the  redemption  of  the  world  by  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,"  no  ex- 
hortation, beyond  the  statement  of  this  fact,  would  have  been 
required.  To  St.  Paul,  perpetual  joy,  unfailing  prayer,  unbroken 
and  universal  thanksgiving  constituted  the  Christian  ideal,  "  the 
will  of  God  in  Christ  Jesus  ". 

It  is  more  than  coincidence  that  the  Apostle's  plea  for  thanks- 
giving is  followed  by  the  words,  '*  Whatsoever  things  are  true, 
whatsoever  things  are  honourable,  whatsoever  things  are  just, 
whatsoever  things  are  pure,  whatsoever  things  are  lovely, 
whatsoever  things  are  of  good  report ;  if  there  be  any  virtue, 
and  if  there  be  any  praise,  think  on  these  things  "  (Phil.  iv.  8). 
Thanksgiving  cannot  be  pumped  up  from  an  empty  mind  and  a 
dried  heart.  It  must  flow  forth  from  a  full  spring.  The  best 
way  to  secure  it  is  to  store  the  mind  with  worthy  themes.  If 
we  think  on  the  things  that  have  praise  and  virtue,  the  stream 
of  thanksgiving  will  break  from  the  rockiest  heart.  We  are 
encouraged  in  this  connexion  by  considering  the  habits  of  singing 
souls.  They  have  accustomed  themselves  to  walk  on  lofty  levels 
within  sight  of  the  majesty  of  God  and  beside  the  cataracts  of 
redemptive  love.  Their  haunts  are  Alpine  heights,  not  valley 
paths,  nor  the  streets  of  a  city.  They  breathe  an  ample  air. 
Their  sanctuary  is  spacious.  It  is  to  be  noted  also  that  they 
tread  the  Via  Dolorosa  frequently.  Their  feet  are  often  found  on 
Calvary's  hill.  The  light  of  the  cross  shines  about  them,  and  the 
sight  of  the  dying  Saviour  awes  them  into  tremulous  love.  Men 
and  women  with  such  habits  never  want  for  themes  of  thanksgiv- 
ing. They  dwell  among  the  splendours  of  the  Divine  revelation, 
and  it  quickens  their  praise  anew  each  time  they  lift  up  their  eyes. 

IF  "  God  give  you  a  good  day,  my  friend,"  said  Tauler  of 
Strasburg  to  a  beggar  whom  he  met  at  a  time  when  he  was  seek- 


THANKSGIVING  139 

ing  a  deeper  knowledge  of  God.  "  I  thank  God,"  said  the  beggar, 
"I  never  have  a  bad  day."  Tauler,  astonished,  changed  the 
form  of  his  salutation.  "  God  give  you  a  happy  life,  friend." 
"I  thank  God,"  said  the  beggar,  "I  am  never  unhappy." 
"  Never  unhappy  !  "  said  Tauler ;  "  what  do  you  mean  ? "  "  Well," 
rejoined  the  beggar,  "when  it  is  fine,  I  thank  God;  when  it 
rains,  I  thank  God ;  when  I  have  plenty,  I  thank  God ;  when  I 
am  hungry,  I  thank  God ;  and  since  God's  will  is  my  will,  and 
whatsoever  pleases  Him  pleases  me,  why  should  I  say  I  am  un- 
happy when  I  am  not?"  "But  what,"  said  Tauler,  "if  God 
were  to  cast  you  hence  into  hell — how  then  ? "  Whereat  the 
beggar  paused  a  moment,  and  then  lifting  his  eyes  upon  him, 
he  answered,  "And  if  He  did,  I  should  have  two  arms  to  embrace 
Him  with — the  arm  of  my  faith,  wherewith  I  lean  upon  His 
holy  humanity,  and  the  arm  of  my  love,  wherewith  I  am  united 
to  His  ineffable  Deity;  and  thus  one  with  Him,  He  would 
descend  thither  with  me,  and  there  would  I  infinitely  rather  be 
with  Him  than  anywhere  else  without  Him."  "But  who  are 
you  ? "  said  Tauler,  taken  aback  by  the  sublimity  of  the  reply. 
"I  am  a  king,"  said  the  beggar.  "A  king!"  said  Tauler; 
"where  is  your  kingdom?"  "In  my  own  heart,"  said  the 
beggar.^ 

3.  Why  is  it  difficult  to  be  thankful  ?  If  we  feel  to-day  that 
we  ought  to  be  thankful,  and  if  we  know  that  hitherto  thanks- 
giving has  formed  too  small  a  part  of  our  devotions,  what  is 
wanted  in  order  that  we  may  do  better  for  the  future,  what  is 
the  preparation  of  the  heart  that  we  shall  need  in  order  that  we 
may  be  able  to  praise  ? 

(1)  Before  praise  there  must  be  penitence.  "Praise  is  not 
seemly  in  the  mouth  of  sinners."  Sin,  unrepented  sin,  is  the 
great  hindrance  to  praise.  Let  this  be  our  first  consideration  if 
we  resolve  to-day  that  for  the  remainder  of  our  lives  we  must 
praise  and  thank  the  Lord  for  His  goodness.  Let  us  resolve,  with 
God's  help,  to  cease  from  all  wilful  sin.  Let  us  think  what  would 
have  troubled  us  most  if  we  had  been  called  during  these  last 
months  to  render  up  the  account  of  our  lives ;  and  let  us,  by  God  s 
help,  put  that  right,  whatever  it  may  be.  Penitence  must  come 
before  praise. 

(2)  But  then  we  may  still  ask  the  question,  Why  is  it  hard 

1 E.  W.  Moore,  The  Christ-Controlled  Life,  5. 


I40      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

to  be  thankful?  Why  do  we  find  it  hard  to  express  our 
thanks  for  a  kindness  that  we  have  received?  Why  is  it 
difficult  to  say  "  Thank  you  "  ?  The  cause  of  our  difficulty  is  our 
pride ;  we  do  not  like  to  seem  to  be  dependent  upon  any  one ;  we 
like  to  assert  oiu*  independence  and  to  claim  what  we  have  as  our 
right.  This  discloses  our  second  need.  If  we  desire  to-day  to  be 
thankful  and  to  praise,  first  we  need  penitence,  and  secondly 
humility.  We  must  acknowledge  our  dependence  upon  God ;  we 
must  fall  down  and  worship  Him. 

IT  I  will  thank  Him  for  the  pleasures  given  me  through  my 
senses,  for  the  glory  of  the  thunder,  for  the  mystery  of  music, 
the  singing  of  birds  and  the  laughter  of  children.  I  will  thank 
Him  for  the  pleasures  of  seeing,  for  the  delights  through  colour, 
for  the  awe  of  the  sunset,  the  beauty  of  flowers,  the  smile  of 
friendship,  and  the  look  of  love ;  for  the  changing  beauty  of  the 
clouds,  for  the  wild  roses  in  the  hedges,  for  the  form  and  the 
beauty  of  birds,  for  the  leaves  on  the  trees  in  spring  and  autumn, 
for  the  witness  of  the  leafless  trees  through  the  winter,  teaching 
us  that  death  is  sleep  and  not  destruction,  for  the  sweetness  of 
flowers  and  the  scent  of  hay.  Truly,  0  Lord,  the  earth  is  full  of 
Thy  riches ! 

And  yet  how  much  more  I  will  thank  and  praise  God  for  the 
strength  of  my  body  enabling  me  to  work,  for  the  refreshment 
of  sleep,  for  my  daily  bread,  for  the  days  of  painless  health,  for 
the  gift  of  my  mind  and  the  gift  of  my  conscience,  for  His  loving 
guidance  of  my  mind  ever  since  it  first  began  to  think,  and  of 
my  heart  ever  since  it  first  began  to  love.  Oh,  from  what  un- 
known errors  has  He  guarded  me,  from  what  beginnings  of  sins 
has  He  kept  me  back !  I  will  praise  Him  for  my  family,  my 
father  and  my  mother,  my  brothers  and  sisters,  my  home,  for  my 
husband,  for  my  wife,  for  the  kindness  of  servants,  and  the  love 
of  children. 

These  are  but  a  few  things  we  can  call  to  mind  instantly  when 
we  think  attentively  and  reverently  of  our  creation  and  preserva- 
tion and  of  the  blessings  of  this  life ;  but  what  shall  we  say  when 
we  think  of  our  redemption  and  of  the  hope  of  the  life  to  come  ? 
What  does  it  mean  ?  That  I  am  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  that 
I  am  a  member  of  Christ  and  a  child  of  God,  that  Christ  loved 
me  and  gave  Himself  for  me,  that  there  is  pardon  for  all  my  sins, 
that  I  have  the  means  of  grace  and  the  hope  of  glory.  What  can 
I  say  to  all  this  but  "  Praise  the  Lord,  O  my  soul,  and  forget  not 
all   his  benefits:    Who   forgiveth   all  thy  sin,   and   healeth  all 


THANKSGIVING  141 

thine  infirmities;   Who  saveth   thy  life  from  destruction;  and 
crowneth  thee  with  mercy  and  loving-kindness  "  ?  ^ 

Ye  are  always  singing  the  good  Lord's  praise, 

And  publishing  all  that  His  hand 
Has  wrought  for  you  in  the  bygone  days, 

And  all  that  His  heart  has  planned. 

And  verily  all  that  ye  say  is  true ; 

For  I  gratefully  confess 
That  whatever  the  Lord  has  done  for  you 

He  has  done  for  me  no  less. 

But  when  I  remember  the  weary  ways 

Which  my  feeble  feet  have  trod, 
And  the  human  love  which  all  my  days 

Has  helped  me  along  the  road, 
Then  the  love  of  man  is  my  song  of  praise 

As  well  as  the  love  of  God. 

And  I  hardly  think  that  I  would  have  seen 

The  love  of  God  so  clear. 
Unless  the  love  of  man  had  been 

So  visible  and  near. 

III. 

1.  Perhaps  the  most  remarkable  difference  between  the  Old 
Testament  and  the  New  Testament  is  the  shifting  of  the  emphasis 
from  petition  to  thanksgiving.  The  Old  Testament  is  indeed  a 
glad  book.  Worshipping  a  God  of  salvation,  a  God  who  had 
saved  and  who  could  save  in  real  and  tangible  ways,  the  people 
could  not  but  be  happy  in  their  worship.  This  at  least  was  the 
mood  of  pre-Exilic  times.  From  the  Exile  onwards,  the  religion 
became  much  more  sombre  ;  but  joy  was  far  from  being  obliter- 
ated. The  call  to  "give  thanks  unto  the  Lord,  for  he  is  good; 
for  his  mercy  endureth  for  ever  "  is  peculiarly  frequent  in  post- 
Exilic  times.  The  107th  Psalm  is  an  eloquent  and  grateful 
testimony  to  the  goodness  of  Jehovah.  Many  of  the  later 
psalms  form  one  continuous  shout  of  jubilation,  and  some  of 
the  later  prayers  acknowledge  very  fully  the  goodness  of  God 
to  Israel  in  history.  Nevertheless,  petition  vastly  outweighs 
thanksgiving.     With  a  deepening  recognition  of  the  majesty  of 

1  Bishop  Edward  King,  Sermons  and  Addresses,  38. 


142      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

God,  petition  becomes  more  reverent.  The  old  complaints,  in 
which  man  spoke  to  God  as  to  a  friend  with  whom  he  was  angry, 
become  fewer  and  fewer.  They  are  common  still  in  Jeremiah ; 
but,  except  for  the  Book  of  Job,  which  is  practically  a  dramatic 
poem,  and  some  stray  utterances  in  the  Psalms,  complaints 
practically  disappear.  With  the  coming  of  Jesus,  however,  the 
absence  of  complaint  merges  into  positive  thanksgiving.  "  Father, 
I  thank  thee " — that  was  the  motto  of  Jesus.  The  change  is 
very  obvious  in  the  prayers  of  His  greatest  disciple.  The  Epistles 
of  Paul  are  crowded  with  prayers  of  thanksgiving,  and  this  pro- 
portion between  thanksgiving  and  petition  is  an  altogether  new 
thing  in  prayer. 

2.  But  is  there  any  thanksgiving  in  the  Lord's  Prayer  ? 
Without  doubt  it  includes  an  unexpressed  thanksgiving.  Indeed 
the  whole  prayer  supposes  the  experience  of  the  grace  of  God, 
although  this  experience  is  not  directly  mentioned.  May  not  the 
simple  "  my  father,"  or  "  my  mother,"  in  a  child's  mouth,  carry 
with  it  such  a  tone  as  to  express  a  warm,  heartfelt  gratitude  for 
all  blessings  received  ?  When,  then,  in  such  a  tone  of  heart  and 
voice  we  say,  "  Our  Father  which  art  in  heaven,"  do  not  these 
words  include  a  sense  of  gratitude  for  every  grace  and  gift  which 
has  descended  on  us  from  above,  from  our  Heavenly  Father  ? 
Every  single  manifestation  of  God's  care  is  a  revelation  of  His 
Fatherly  love  and  mercy  towards  us.  Who  can  pray  in  earnest 
concerning  God's  name.  His  kingdom,  or  the  forgiveness  of  sins, 
without  having  iSrst  consciously  realized  that  He  has  revealed 
His  name  to  us,  founded  His  kingdom  of  grace  among  us,  promised 
and  imparted  forgiveness  of  sins  to  us?  But  whoever  truly 
realizes  all  this  will  certainly  render  thanks  for  it,  render  thanks 
even  in  silence.     The  two  things,  indeed,  are  one. 

3.  Songs  of  praise  are  unusually  abundant  in  the  Book  of  Reve- 
lation. Day  and  night  they  rise  from  the  lips  of  the  four  living 
creatures  to  Him  that  sitteth  upon  the  throne.  And  the  reason 
why  the  great  multitude  in  heaven  rejoices  and  gives  the  glory 
to  God  is  because  Christ  has  conquered  the  world,  and  He  shall 
reign  for  ever  and  ever.  The  scene  is  set  in  heaven,  and  the 
vision  is  a  vision  of  faith,  not  of  reality ;  yet,  though  of  faith,  it 


THANKSGIVING  143 

is  intensely  real.  The  writer  sees,  if  only  with  the  eye  of  faith, 
what  Jeremiah  had  longed  to  see,  and  was  perplexed  and  grieved 
because  he  could  not  see — the  manifest  vindication  of  the  moral 
order,  the  indisputable  triumph  of  the  Kingdom  of  God.  "  We 
give  thee  thanks,  O  Lord  God,  the  Almighty,  because  thou  hast 
taken  thy  great  power  and  didst  reign."  He  had  proved  Himself 
more  than  a  match  in  the  struggle  with  the  cruel  powers  of  evil. 
Salvation  and  power  belonged  to  Him,  because  He  had  "judged 
the  great  harlot  and  avenged  the  blood  of  his  servants  ".  They 
had  poured  out  the  blood  of  the  saints  and  prophets,  "  and  blood 
hast  thou  given  them  to  drink:  they  are  worthy".  Therefore 
Hallelujah,  and  again  Hallelujah.  Yes,  "  righteous  art  thou,  true 
and  righteous  are  thy  judgments ".  It  is  the  contemplation  of 
the  Divine  justice,  of  the  thoroughness  and  terribleness  of  the 
Divine  judgment  upon  the  gigantic  forces  of  evil,  of  the  victory 
of  right  and  good  and  God — it  is  these  things  that  stir  the  writer's 
blood.  In  its  longing  for  a  vindication  of  the  moral  order  by  the 
Divine  vengeance  upon  all  opposed  to  that  order,  this  great  literary 
witness  to  the  spirit  of  Jewish  Christianity  stands  very  near  the 
Old  Testament.  But  the  book,  though  intensely  Jewish,  is  also  in- 
tensely Christian.  It  draws  its  inspiration,  if  not  always  from 
the  spirit  of  Jesus,  at  any  rate  from  an  absolute  faith  in  Him,  an 
immovable  confidence  in  His  power  and  ultimate  victory.  This 
confidence  is  enthusiastically  shared  by  all  the  writers  of  the  New 
Testament ;  and  so  it  is  fitting  that  although  the  New  Testament 
doxologies  are  usually  offered  to  God,  there  is  at  least  one  un- 
disputed doxology  to  Christ.  "  To  him  be  the  glory  both  now 
and  for  ever.     Amen." 

IF  How  can  man  effectually  ascribe  to  Christ  "  glory  and 
dominion  for  ever  and  ever  "  ?  Not  merely  by  uttering.  Amen, 
but  by  living  Amen.  To  use  the  grace  of  God's  most  bountiful 
salutation,  thereby  attaining  His  peace,  constitutes  us  His  faithful 
servants  and  patient  saints ;  servants  who  shall  see  His  face  and 
serve  Him  in  perfection ;  saints  in  whom  He  shall  be  glorified 
when  He  cometh  to  be  admired  in  all  them  that  believe.  "  Lord, 
I  believe  ;  help  thou  mine  unbelief."  Lord  Jesus,  what  joy  was 
that,  what  covetable  good,  for  whose  sake  Thou  didst  endure  the 
Cross,  despising  the  shame?  Not  for  glory  and  dominion  for 
ever  and  ever  simply  and  for  their  own  sake.  Already  Thou 
hadst  glory  with  the  Father  before  the  world  was,  and  dominion 


144      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

and  fear  were  with  Thee  before  man  transgressed  Thy  command- 
ment. Nay,  rather,  it  was  that  as  the  bridegroom  rejoiceth  over 
the  bride,  so  mightest  Thou  rejoice  over  us.  If  Thou  hadst  given 
no  more  than  all  the  substance  of  Thy  house  for  love,  it  might 
have  been  contemned  :  but  Thou  hast  given  Thyself.  What  shall 
we  give  Thee  in  return  ?     What  shall  we  not  give  Thee  ?  ^ 

IV. 

1.  Thanksgiving  is  with  joy.  It  is  the  expression  of  the  glad 
heart.  That  is  why  the  Book  of  Psalms  is  a  book  of  joy :  it  is 
a  book  of  thanksgiving.  This  old  Hebrew  classic  has  gone 
through  the  generations  of  men  as  an  angel  of  the  presence  of  the 
Lord,  entering  into  the  huts  of  the  lowly  and  filling  them  with 
the  radiance  of  God,  penetrating  the  gloom  of  the  palace  and  mak- 
ing it  as  the  sanctuary  of  the  Highest,  lighting  the  path  of  the 
weary  pilgrim  in  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death,  spreading 
with  plenty  the  tables  of  life  even  in  the  presence  of  enemies, 
and  filling  him  with  the  assurance  that  God  will  lead  him  in  the 
path  of  life,  until  he  stands  in  that  presence  where  there  are  ful- 
ness of  joy  and  pleasures  for  evermore.  Like  the  good  shepherd, 
it  has  led  the  flock  of  God  beside  the  still  waters  of  peace  and 
into  the  green  pastures  of  truth.  Like  a  conquering  general,  it 
has  braced  the  sacramental  hosts  of  God  for  the  fight  against  evil 
and  for  righteousness  and  liberty.  It  has  been  medicine  to  the 
diseased,  an  anodyne  to  care,  a  solace  for  the  sad,  a  herald  of 
deliverance  to  the  imprisoned,  courage  for  the  despondent,  a  light 
shining  in  the  dark  places  of  life,  and  an  unfailing  fountain  of  joy. 
The  religion  of  the  Psalms  is  the  religion  of  thanksgiving,  of 
triumphant  joy  in  God ;  and  the  book  itself  is,  excepting  one, 
the  best  commentary  upon  the  words,  "  Whoso  offereth  praise 
glorifieth  God".  That  other  and  better  exposition  is  the  New 
Testament.  It  takes  the  songs  of  the  prophet-poets  and  sets 
them  in  a  new  key.  It  makes  it  possible  for  men  to  surpass  the 
heroism  of  the  martyrs  of  the  Maccabean  time,  and  to  exhibit  a 
steadfastness  of  purpose  and  fulness  of  joy,  and  even  exultation 
of  soul  in  tribulation,  which  show  that  they  ascended  to  higher 
ranges  of  life  than  the  finest  of  the  Hebrew  race  before.  It  is 
the  fruit,  no  doubt,  of  the  principles  which  Christianity  takes  up 
1  Christina  G.  Bossetti,  Th6  Fac6  of  the  Deep,  18. 


THANKSGIVING  145 

out  of  the  Old  Testament,  but  it  is  expressed  with  greater  clear- 
ness and  force  in  the  concrete  example  of  Jesus  Christ  Himself, 
and  demonstrated  in  a  great  series  of  historic  facts,  of  which  He 
is  the  centre  and  the  source.  The  three  thousand  on  the  day  of 
Pentecost  scarcely  had  met  together  before  it  is  remarked  that 
they  ate  their  meat  with  gladness  and  singleness  of  heart,  prais- 
ing God  and  having  favour  with  all  the  people. 

IT  One  reason  why  prayers  of  thanksgiving  are  relatively  far 
fewer  in  the  Old  Testament  than  in  the  New  is  that  fulness  of 
joy  is  possible  only  to  those  who  are  partakers  of  the  salvation 
proclaimed  and  wrought  by  Jesus.  But  even  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment there  is  a  deep  under-current  of  joy.  The  religious  festivals 
of  pre-Exilic  times  were  happy  gatherings  at  which  men  rejoiced 
and  were  glad,  as  they  looked  at  the  produce  of  the  field  and 
vine-clad  hill-side,  and  reminded  themselves  of  the  Divine  good- 
ness ;  and  even  post- Exilic  religion,  though  in  many  ways  sombre, 
is  also  glad.     Worship  was  solemn  but  happy. 

"  Enter  into  his  gates  with  thanksgiving. 
And  into  his  courts  with  praise  : 
Give  thanks  unto  him  and  bless  his  name. 
For  Jehovah  is  good;  his  love  is  everlasting."  ^ 

IF  It  is  told  that  when  the  New  England  Colonies  were  first 
planted,  the  settlers  endured  many  privations  and  difficulties. 
Being  piously  disposed,  they  laid  their  distresses  before  God  in 
frequent  days  of  fasting  and  prayer.  Constant  meditation  on 
such  topics  kept  their  minds  gloomy  and  discontented,  and  made 
them  disposed  even  to  return  to  their  Fatherland  with  all  its 
persecutions.  At  length,  when  it  was  proposed  to  appoint  a  day 
of  fasting  and  prayer,  a  plain,  common-sense  old  colonist  was  in 
the  meeting,  and  remarked  that  he  thought  they  had  brooded 
long  enough  over  their  misfortunes,  and  that  it  seemed  high  time 
they  should  consider  some  of  their  mercies — that  the  colony  was 
growing  strong,  the  fields  increasing  in  harvests,  the  rivers  full 
of  fish,  and  the  woods  of  game,  the  air  sweet,  the  climate 
salubrious,  and  their  homes  happy  ;  above  all,  that  they  possessed 
what  they  came  for,  full  civil  and  religious  liberty.  And  there- 
fore, on  the  whole,  he  would  amend  their  resolution  for  a  fast, 
and  propose  in  its  stead  a  day  of  thanksgiving.  His  advice  was 
taken,  and  from  that  day  to  this  the  festival  has  been  an  annual 
one.2 

1  J.  E.  MoFadyen,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible,  62.  2  g.  Conway. 

10 


146      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

2.  The  joy  comes  when  we  recognize  the  Giver  more  than 
we  appreciate  the  gift.  What  can  bring  us  such  joy  in  prayer 
as  the  knowledge  that  we  are  in  a  Father's  immediate  presence  ? 
How  many  Christians  are  listless  and  irregular  in  their  prayers 
because  they  have  no  clear  conception  of  the  nature  of  God.  He 
is  only  a  vast  and  distant  abstraction  to  them,  so  that  they  can- 
not concentrate  their  thoughts  upon  Him.  Because  He  possesses 
no  reality,  no  tender  personality  for  them,  their  prayers  are  cold, 
lifeless,  unreal.  They  drop  out  of  prayerful  habits  altogether, 
because  prayer  never  seems  to  do  them  any  good.  What  is  the 
cure  for  such  a  miserable  state  of  things  as  this  ?  It  is  of  little 
use  to  tell  them  that  when  they  are  able  to  pray  the  least  they 
need  to  pray  the  most.  That  is  true  enough,  but  it  does  not 
cure  the  evil.  What  will  give  back  to  their  prayer  its  old  joyful- 
ness  ?  What  will  make  prayer  once  again  in  their  lives  a  glad 
spontaneous  exercise  of  soul,  rather  than  a  dreary  and  irksome 
duty  ?  Only  a  new  vision  of  the  Father  who  is  good  unto  all. 
Let  them  dwell  upon  that  Name  until  it  becomes  instinct  with 
new  meaning.  Let  them  feed  upon  it  in  thought  until  it  lays 
hold  of  them  with  all  the  power  of  its  tender  import.  Let  them 
gaze  up  into  the  darkness  with  the  word  "  Father  "  upon  their 
lips,  until  a  Father's  face  shines  out  of  the  black  vacancy,  until  a 
Father's  arms  appear  outstretched  in  love,  until  a  Father's  voice 
falls  upon  their  waiting  ears  saying,  "  My  child,  come  near  to 
Me  ".  Then  all  the  dull,  dreary  unreality  will  vanish  from  their 
devotions.  Prayer  will  become  a  new  thing  to  them,  transformed, 
irradiated,  glorified  by  the  tender  beauty  of  that  vision,  and  the 
little  child  will  not  find  more  joy  in  the  presence  of  an  earthly 
parent  than  the  Christian  will  find  in  his  intercourse  with  God. 

IF  Prayer  is  an  expression  of  the  faith  which  lays  hold  of  the 
reconciliation  and  filial  relation  offered  us  by  God's  grace,  and 
which  makes  joyous  gratitude  the  normal  and  fundamental  mood 
of  the  Christian.  Therefore  it  must  be  in  its  essence  thanksgiv- 
ing. The  view  that  petition  or  confession  is  the  rule,  and  that 
thanksgiving  is  a  kind  of  prayer  that  is  offered  only  in  the  event 
of  the  fulfilment  of  petitions  or  of  a  particular  manifestation  of 
grace,  is  a  view  that  suits  only  religions  in  which  God  is  chiefly 
one  who  gives  men  their  desires,  or  else  legal  religions.^ 

1  J.  Gottsohiok.  Ethik,  137. 


THANKSGIVING 


147 


IF  In  thanksgiving  we  rightly  appreciate  what  has  been  ex- 
perienced by  us.  We  not  only  regard  the  gift,  but  also  take 
account  of  the  Giver  ;  we  not  only  make  clear  to  ourselves  what 
has  been  wrought,  but  also  remember  the  Worker.  An  occurrence 
which  moves  us  to  thanksgiving  has  become  to  us  a  revelation  of 
God.  So  far  as  we  are  able  to  give  thanks,  so  far  God  is  manifest 
to  us  in  His  working.^ 

^  A.  Schlatter,  Das  Christliche  Dogma,  220. 


VIII. 
The  First  Principles  of  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H.,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 

Biederwolf,  W.  E.,  How  Can  God  Answer  Prayer?  (1913). 

Brierley,  J.,  Religion  and  To-Day  (1913). 

Brooks,  P.,  The  Mystery  of  Iniquity  (1893). 

Carpenter,  W.  B.,  Thoughts  on  Prayer  (1907). 

Dods,  M.,  Footsteps  iii  the  Path  of  Life  (1909). 

Findlay,  G.  G.,  The  Epistle  to  the  Galatians  (1888). 

Gibson,  J.  M.,  The  Glory  of  Life  on  Earth  (1900). 

Gordon,  S.  D.,  Quiet  Talks  on  Prayer. 

Gore,  C,  St.  Paul's  Epistle  to  the  Romans,  i.  (1899). 

Greenwell,  Dora,  Essays  (1867). 

Hutton,  R.  H.,  Aspects  of  Religious  and  Scientific  Thought  (1899). 

McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 

Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

Martensen,  H.,  Christian  Ethics,  i.  (1881). 

Monrad,  D.  G.,  The  World  of  Prayer  (1879). 

Murray,  A.,  With  Christ  in  the  School  of  Prayer  (1899). 

„         „     The  Prayer-Life  (1914). 
Myers,  C,  Real  Prayer  (1911). 

Robinson,  A.  W.,  The  Voice  of  Joy  and  Health  (1911). 
Ross,  G.  A.  J.,  The  God  We  Trust  (1913). 
Stevens,  G.  B.,  Doctrine  and  Life  (1895). 
Swetenham,  L.,  Conquering  Prayer  (1908). 
Tailing,  M.  P.,  Extempore  Prayer  (1902). 
Thomas,  H.  A.,  in  Faith  and  Criticism  (1893). 
Thomas,  W.  H.  G.,  Life  Abiding  and  Abounding. 
Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 
Expositor,  2nd  Ser.,  vi.  (1883)  310  (J.  Morison). 
London  Quarterly  Review,  July  1908,  p.  1  (P.  T.  Forsyth). 


150 


The  First  Principles  of  Prayer. 

There  is  an  aspect  of  the  Christian  doctrine  of  prayer  which 
seems  to  be  sadly  overlooked.  It  is  the  necessity  of  our  fulfill- 
ing those  conditions  of  obedience,  trust,  and  service  on  which 
alone  God  can  give  us  the  richest  of  His  spiritual  mercies.  Is 
there  not  something  amounting  almost  to  mockery  in  the  way  in 
which  we  often  ask  for  the  highest  spiritual  blessings,  and  then 
give  no  thought  to  fulfilling  in  our  lives  the  conditions  on  which 
alone  they  can  come  to  us  ?  Perhaps  this  failure  to  grasp  the 
deeper  import  of  prayer  has  its  roots  in  the  idea  that  prayer  is 
mere  petition.  If,  however,  we  perceive  that  prayer  springs  from 
and  expresses  the  Christian  life  in  all  its  depths  of  conviction  and 
devotion,  we  must  see  that  there  are  conditions  of  receptiveness 
on  our  part  which  must  be  fulfilled,  if  our  prayers  are  to  avail 
before  God.  Do  we  not  often  pray  for  blessings  which  we  are  all 
unfitted  to  receive  ?  Would  we  not  do  well  to  pray  that  God 
would  make  us  able  and  fit  to  receive  His  gifts,  to  open  our 
eyes  that  we  might  see  them,  and  our  hearts  that  we  might  be 
able  to  take  them  ?  They  wait  to  descend  upon  us.  They  will 
wait  no  longer  than  the  time  when  they  can  wisely  be  given. 

The  conditions  of  prevailing  prayer  are  not  all  of  the  same 
importance.  They  may  be  divided  into  First  Principles,  Personal 
Demands,  and  Minor  Aids.  In  this  chapter  we  shall  consider  the 
three  First  Principles. 

I. 

According  to  the  Will  of  God. 

The  one  principle,  out-ranking  all  others,  first  and  supreme, 
which  governs  prayer  is  God's  purpose.  The  petitioner  is  placed 
by  the  nature  of  the  case  where  he  must  recognize  the  sovereignty 
of  God.     Every  prayer  must  conform  to  the  Divine  will.     We 

151 


152       CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

are  living  in  God's  universe  and  are  part  of  it.  His  we  are  by- 
right  of  creation,  preservation,  and  redemption  ;  placed  here  not 
to  interrupt  His  plans  but,  by  co-operation  with  Him,  to  accom- 
plish His  purpose.  Prayer,  therefore,  is  not  dictation,  is  not 
advice,  but  the  request  a  child  makes  of  its  parent,  trusting 
superior  wisdom,  reposing  in  undoubted  love,  and  desiring  success 
in  no  particular  petition  which  may  be  inconsistent  with  general 
and  permanent  welfare. 

Suppose,  then,  that  two  men,  meek,  lowly,  righteous,  agree 
to  ask  for  rain,  let  us  say,  or  for  the  recovery  of  some  friend  who 
is  tossing  to  and  fro  under  the  grip  of  some  dire  disease,  or  for 
the  patients  in  a  hospital,  or  in  all  hospitals,  or  for  the  conversion 
of  some  sinner,  or  of  all  sinners — will  their  prayer,  in  its  real 
essence  and  import,  be  answered  ?  Will  their  desire,  in  its  real 
intensity,  be  granted  ?  Assuredly  it  will,  if  the  exceeding  great 
and  precious  promises  which  are  written  in  the  volume  of  the 
book  be  indeed  "  yea  and  amen  ".  Why,  then,  are  any  sinners 
unconverted  ?  Why  are  any  of  the  diseased  unhealed  ?  Why- 
is  there  any  distress  at  all  ?  Why  is  there  any  anguish  of 
nations,  any  inward  commotions,  or  mutual  antagonisms  ?  Why 
are  there  any  wars  ?  Why  any  woes  ?  Is  it  because  the  prayers 
of  the  righteous  for  the  great  masses  of  the  world  have  been 
withheld  ?  No ;  for  Jesus  prayed,  and  Paul  prayed,  and  John 
prayed,  and  Elijah  prayed.  Is  it  then  because  their  earnest  ener- 
gizing prayers  have  been  unanswered  ?  No ;  for  the  promises 
are  "  yea  and  amen ".  What  then?  The  whole  difficulty  takes 
flight  when  we  notice  that  in  a  meek  and  lowly  and  holy  soul  there 
cannot  be  unconditional  or  absolute  desires  for  any  of  the  objects 
specified.  All  desires  for  such  objects  are  desires  with  an  underly- 
ing condition  expressed  or  understood.  They  are  petitions  de- 
pendent on  other  elements  of  desire,  which  spread  out  wider  and 
draw  deeper.  And  these  underlying  desires  are  but  partial 
aspects  of  one  great  element  of  desire  which  absorbs  within  itself 
all  details  of  desire.  Minute  details  of  desire  are  never  abso- 
lute, and  never  detached.  They  are  all  and  always  but  partial 
aspects  of  one  great  desire.  That  great  desire  is  this — that  God 
should  do,  in  every  given  case  or  conjuncture,  what  it  would  be 
wisest  and  best,  all  things  considered,  and  all  interests  consulted, 
for  Him  to  do — what  would  be  most  in  harmony  with  our  moral 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER     153 

constitution  and  with  His  own  moral  government.    In  its  ultimate 
and  sublimest  form  it  is  this — "  Thy  will  be  done." 

1.  The  will  of  God  gives  us  the  due  and  necessary  limit  of 
prayer.  There  are  many  things  for  which  we  never  think  of 
asking,  simply  because  they  are  not  only  not  included  in,  but  are 
clearly  opposed  to,  His  revealed  will.  There  are  other  matters 
about  which  we  are  certain  that  they  are  according  to  His  will, 
and  as  to  these  we  plead  His  promises  and  continue  praying, 
waiting,  expecting  the  answer  in  God's  good  time.  Yet  again, 
there  are  many  things  about  which  there  is  no  revelation  in  the 
Word  of  God,  and  with  reference  to  these  we  pray  in  submission 
to  the  will  of  God,  and  wait  His  way  of  revealing  to  us  in  daily 
circumstances  and  experience  whether  the  prayer  is  in  harmony 
with  His  purpose  concerning  us.  This  spirit  of  submissiveness  is 
one  of  the  primary  conditions  of  prayer  and  one  of  the  essential 
marks  of  a  true  spiritual  life.  Our  Lord,  in  Gethsemane,  prayed 
in  this  spirit,  "  Not  my  will,  but  thine,  be  done,"  and  when  the 
soul  is  ready  to  trust  God  fully  and  rest  on  His  perfect  wisdom, 
the  joyous  experience  is  that  of  the  Apostle  when  he  said,  "  This 
is  the  confidence  that  we  have  in  him,  that,  if  we  ask  anything 
according  to  his  will,  he  heareth  us  "  (1  John  v.  14). 

If  But  is  not  the  promise  in  Mark  iL  24  an  unqualified  one  ? 
Yes,  but  within  the  limits  that  are  well  understood  to  exist 
between  the  two  contracting  parties.  Here  is  a  man  with  a  well- 
defined  plan  for  a  house.  He  turns  the  work  over  to  the  con- 
tractor, with  a  promise  to  supply  whatever  he  might  want. 
Very  soon  there  comes  a  request  for  an  extra  supply  of  material 
to  erect  a  few  towers  which  in  the  opinion  of  the  contractor 
would  very  much  beautify  the  building.  Here  is  a  father  who 
has  a  plan  for  his  boy's  future.  He  sends  him  to  college,  saying, 
"Send  to  me  for  whatever  you  want  and  you  shall  receive  it  ". 
In  a  few  months  the  boy  sends  home  for  an  extra  supply  of  cash 
for  certain  side-issues  of  questionable  propriety.  Each  of  these 
requests  are  properly  denied.  And  yet  each  of  the  petitioners 
might  say  that  the  promise  was  unqualified.^ 

2.  But  how  can  we  know  if  what  we  ask  is  in  accordance 
with  the  will  of  God  ?  Just  this  is  the  difficulty.  More  than 
one  believer  says  :  "  I  do  not  know  if  what  I  desire  be  according 

1  W.  E.  Biederwolf,  How  can  God  Answer  Prayer^  183. 


154      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

to  the  will  of  God.  God's  will  is  the  purpose  of  His  infinite 
wisdom  :  it  is  impossible  for  me  to  know  whether  He  may  not 
count  something  else  better  for  me  than  what  I  desire,  or  may 
not  have  some  reasons  for  withholding  what  I  ask."  Every  one 
feels  that  with  such  thoughts  the  prayer  of  faith,  of  which  Jesus 
said,  "  Whosoever  shall  believe  that  those  things  which  he  saith 
shall  come  to  pass,  he  shall  have  whatsoever  he  saith,"  becomes 
an  impossibility.  There  may  be  the  prayer  of  submission,  and 
of  trust  in  God's  wisdom ;  there  cannot  be  the  prayer  of  faith. 
The  great  mistake  here  is  that  God's  children  do  not  really  be- 
lieve that  it  is  possible  to  know  God's  will.  Or  if  they  believe 
this,  they  do  not  take  the  time  and  trouble  to  find  it  out.  What 
we  need  is  to  see  clearly  in  what  way  it  is  that  the  Father  leads 
His  waiting,  teachable  child  to  know  that  his  petition  is  accord- 
ing to  His  will.  It  is  (1)  through  God's  holy  Word,  taken  up  and 
kept  in  the  heart,  the  life,  the  will ;  and  (2)  through  God's  Holy 
Spirit,  accepted  in  His  indwelling  and  leading,  that  we  shall 
learn  to  know  that  our  petitions  are  according  to  His  will. 

(1)  Through  the  Word. — There  is  a  secret  will  of  God,  with 
which  we  often  fear  that  our  prayers  may  be  at  variance.  It  is 
not  with  this  will  of  God,  but  His  will  as  revealed  in  His  Word, 
that  we  have  to  do  in  prayer.  Our  notions  of  what  the  secret 
will  may  have  decreed,  and  of  how  it  might  render  the  answers 
to  our  prayers  impossible,  are  mostly  very  erroneous.  Childlike 
faith  as  to  what  He  is  willing  to  do  for  His  children  simply 
keeps  to  the  Father's  assurance  that  it  is  His  will  to  hear  prayer 
and  to  do  what  faith  in  His  Word  desires  and  accepts.  In  the 
Word  the  Father  has  revealed,  in  general  promises,  the  great 
principles  of  His  will  with  His  people.  The  child  has  to  take  the 
promise  and  apply  it  to  the  special  circumstances  in  His  life  to 
which  it  has  reference.  Whatever  he  asks  within  the  limits  of 
that  revealed  will,  he  can  know  to  be  according  to  the  will  of  God, 
and  he  may  confidently  expect.  In  His  Word,  God  has  given  us 
the  revelation  of  His  will  and  plans  with  us,  with  His  people, 
and  with  the  world,  with  the  most  precious  promises  of  the  grace 
and  power  with  which  through  His  people  He  will  carry  out  His 
plans  and  do  His  work.  As  faith  becomes  strong  and  bold  enough 
to  claim  the  fulfilment  of  the  general  promise  in  the  special  case, 
we  may  have  the  assurance  that  our  prayers  are  heard  ;  they  are 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER     155 

according  to  God's  will.  Take  these  words  of  John:  "If  any 
man  see  his  brother  sinning  a  sin  not  unto  death,  he  shall  ask, 
and  God  will  give  him  life".  Such  is  the  general  promise  ;  and 
the  believer  who  pleads  on  the  ground  of  this  promise  prays  ac- 
cording to  the  will  of  God,  and  John  would  give  him  boldness  to 
know  that  he  has  the  petition  which  he  asks. 

(2)  Through  the  Spirit. — The  apprehension  of  God's  will  is 
something  spiritual,  and  must  be  spiritually  discerned.  It  is  not 
as  a  matter  of  logic  that  we  can  argue  it  out.  God  has  said  it ; 
I  must  have  it.  Nor  has  every  Christian  the  same  gift  or  calling. 
While  the  general  will  revealed  in  the  promise  is  the  same  for 
all,  there  is  for  each  a  special  different  will  according  to  God's 
purpose.  And  herein  is  the  wisdom  of  the  saints,  to  know  this 
special  will  of  God  for  each  of  us,  according  to  the  measure  of 
grace  given  us,  and  so  to  ask  in  prayer  just  what  God  has  prepared 
and  made  possible  for  each.  It  is  to  communicate  this  wisdom 
that  the  Holy  Ghost  dwells  in  us.  The  personal  application  of 
the  general  promises  of  the  Word  to  our  special  personal  needs — 
it  is  for  this  that  the  leading  of  the  Holy  Spirit  is  given  us. 

IF  I  count  it  one  of  the  most  precious  lessons  God  wants  to 
teach  through  the  experience  of  George  Miiller,  that  He  is  willing 
to  make  known,  of  things  of  which  His  word  says  nothing  directly, 
that  they  are  His  will  for  us,  and  that  we  may  ask  them.  The 
teaching  of  the  Spirit,  not  without  or  against  the  Word,  but  as 
something  above  and  beyond  it,  in  addition  to  it,  without  which 
we  cannot  see  God's  will,  is  the  heritage  of  every  believer.  It  is 
through  the  Word,  and  the  Word  alone,  that  the  Spirit  teaches, 
applying  the  general  principles  or  promises  to  our  special  need. 
And  it  is  the  Spirit,  and  the  Spirit  alone,  who  can  really  make 
the  Word  a  light  on  our  path,  whether  the  path  of  duty  in  our 
daily  walk  or  the  path  of  faith  in  our  approach  to  God.^ 

3.  Sincere  prayer  is  answered  although  the  will  of  God  is  not 
clearly  seen.  Even  to  the  purest  and  most  devoted  souls,  that 
will  may  for  a  time  remain  obscure  and  inscrutable.  Paul  prayed, 
not  once,  nor  twice,  but  thrice,  for  the  removal  of  the  thorn  ;  and 
Jesus  offered  up  prayers  and  supplications  with  crying  and  tears 
that  the  terrible  cup  might  pass  from  Him.  In  the  strict  sense, 
neither  of  these  prayers  was  answered.    The  cup  had  to  be  drained 

^  A.  Murray,  With  Christ  in  the  School  of  Prayer,  263. 


156      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

to  the  dregs — "  My  God,  My  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me  ?  " 
— and  the  flesh  continued  to  be  tormented  by  the  thorn.  Yet  in 
the  deepest  sense  these  prayers  were  both  answered.  Over- 
shadowing the  prayer  for  the  removal  of  the  cup  and  the  thorn 
was  the  prayer  that  the  will  of  God  be  done,  and  that  prayer  was 
abundantly  answered.  By  each  of  the  sufferers  that  will  was 
accepted,  and  in  it  they  found  strength  and  peace.  Paul  learned 
a  more  abundant  experience  of  the  Divine  grace  through  the 
strength  which  he  felt  to  possess  him  even  in  his  weakness,  so 
that  the  very  rejection  of  his  prayer  became  to  him  a  gracious 
and  brilliant  answer.  So  it  was  with  our  Lord.  He  was  heard, 
as  the  author  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  reminds  us.  The 
cup  was  not  removed,  but  strength  was  given  Him  to  drink  it. 
From  His  knees  He  rose  victorious ;  and  in  the  strength  that 
came  upon  Him  after  the  agony  of  His  prayer  in  the  garden,  He 
stepped  quietly  forth  to  face  treachery  and  death. 

Into  the  woods  my  Master  went. 

Clean  forspent,  forspent. 

Into  the  woods  my  Master  came, 

Forspent  with  love  and  shame. 

But  the  olives  they  were  not  blind  to  Him, 

The  little  gray  leaves  were  kind  to  Him  : 

The  thorn-tree  had  a  mind  to  Him 

When  into  the  woods  He  came. 

Out  of  the  woods  my  Master  went. 

And  He  was  well  content. 

Out  of  the  woods  my  Master  came, 

Content  with  death  and  shame. 

When  Death  and  Shame  would  woo  Him  last, 

From  under  the  trees  they  drew  Him  last : 

'Twas  on  a  tree  they  slew  Him — last 

When  out  of  the  woods  He  came.^ 

4.  Obedience  to  the  will  of  God  is  not  mere  submission,  mere 
resignation.  It  is  not  always  acquiescence,  even  in  prayer.  We 
obey  God  as  much  when  we  urge  our  suit,  and  make  a  real  peti- 
tion of  it,  as  when  we  accept  His  decision  ;  as  much  when  we  try 
to  change  His  will  as  when  we  bow  to  it.     The  Kingdom  of 

1  Sidney  Lanier, 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER     157 

Heaven  suffereth  violence.  There  is  a  very  fine  passage  in  Dante, 
Parad.  xx.  94  (Longfellow's  trans.) : — 

Regnum  coeloruon  suffereth  violence 

From  fervent  love,  and  from  that  living  hope 

That  overcometh  the  Divine  volition ; 

Not  in  the  guise  that  man  o'ercometh  man, 

But  conquers  it  because  it  will  be  conquered, 
And  conquered  conquers  by  benignity. 

It  is  His  will — His  will  of  grace — that  prayer  should  prevail  with 
Him  and  extract  blessings.  And  how  we  love  the  grace  that  so 
concedes  them  !  The  answer  to  prayer  is  not  the  complaisance 
of  a  playful  power  lightly  yielding  to  the  playful  egoism  of  His 
favourites.  "  Our  antagonist  is  our  helper."  To  struggle  with 
Him  is  one  way  of  doing  His  will.  To  resist  is  one  way  of  say- 
ing "  Thy  will  be  done  ".  It  was  God's  will  that  Christ  should 
deprecate  the  death  God  required.  It  pleased  God  as  much  as 
His  submission  to  death.  But  could  it  have  been  pleasing  to  Him 
that  Christ  should  pray  so,  if  no  prayer  could  ever  possibly  change 
God's  will  ?  Could  Christ  have  prayed  so  in  that  belief  ?  Would 
faith  ever  inspire  us  to  pray  if  the  God  of  our  faith  must  be 
unmoved  by  prayer  ?  The  prayer  that  goes  to  an  inflexible  God, 
however  good  He  is,  is  prayer  that  rises  more  from  human  need 
than  (where  Christian  prayer  should  rise)  from  God's  own  revela- 
tion or  from  Christian  faith.  It  is  His  will,  then,  that  we  should 
pray  against  what  seems  His  will,  and  what,  for  the  lower  stage 
of  our  growth,  is  His  will.  And  all  this  without  any  unreality 
whatever. 

IT  Let  us  beware  of  a  pietish  fatalism  which  thins  the  spiritual 
life,  saps  the  vigour  of  character,  makes  humility  mere  acquiesc- 
ence, and  piety  only  feminine,  by  banishing  the  will  from  prayer 
as  much  as  thought  has  been  banished  from  it.  "  The  curse  of  so 
much  religion,"  says  Mr.  Meredith,  "  is  that  men  cling  to  God  with 
their  weakness  rather  than  with  their  strength."  The  popularity 
of  much  acquiescence  is  not  because  it  is  holier  but  because  it  is 
easier.  And  an  easy  gospel  is  the  consumption  that  attacks 
Christianity.     It  is  the  phthisis  of  faith. ^ 

IF  Prayer  is  the  voice  of  one  who  was  created  free,  although 
he  was  born  in  chains;    it  is  at  once  self-assertion  and  self- 

1  P.  T.  Forsyth,  in  The  London  Quarterly  Review,  July  1908,  p.  21. 


158      CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

surrender ;  it  claims  a  will  even  in  surrendering  it,  when  it  says, 
"  Not  my  will,  but  thine,  be  done."  It  is,  perhaps,  the  greatest  of 
all  witnesses  to  the  spiritual  nature  of  man,  as  nothing  so  dignifies 
human  nature,  or  so  enhances  the  sense  of  its  fixed  relation  with 
the  Divine  as  does  prayer,  the  true  conception  of  which  involves 
the  idea  of  a  certain  power  possessed  by  humanity  over  God. 
Neither  is  there  any  such  other  witness  to  man's  spiritual  freedom 
as  is  wrapped  up  in  prayer,  man's  permitted,  though  submitted, 
wish  and  will  and  choice.  When  God  gave  man  reason,  says 
Milton,  He  gave  him  freedom  to  choose,  for  freedom  is  but  choos- 
ing. Prayer  is  God's  acknowledgment,  His  indorsement  of  His 
own  gift  of  freedom  to  man ;  it  is  His  royal  invitation  (an  invita- 
tion which  has  in  it  the  nature  and  force  of  a  command)  to  man 
to  exert  this  privilege,  to  use  this  power.  It  is  God  the  Almighty 
who  says,  and  who  says  to  man,  "  Ask  me  concerning  my  sons, 
and  concerning  the  work  of  my  hands  command  ye  me."  ^ 

5.  Prayer  according  to  the  will  of  God  is  not  the  annihilation 
of  the  human  will,  it  is  the  annihilation  of  all  that  in  the  human 
will  is  selfish.  In  prayer  the  profoundest  act  of  conscience  and 
obedience  is  inwardly  accomplished,  for  prayer  is  a  laying  hold 
and  appropriation  of  God  only  in  so  far  as  it  is  likewise  a  sacrifice  ; 
and  we  can  receive  God  into  us  only  when  we  likewise  give  our- 
selves to  Him.  He  who  offers  no  sacrifice  in  his  prayer,  who 
does  not  sacrifice  his  self-will  does  not  really  pray.  But  this 
sacrifice  of  surrender  and  obedience  is  true  and  pure  only  when 
it  is  the  sacrifice  of  free  love,  when  under  it  the  position  of  the 
servant  is  transformed  into  that  of  the  child.  By  such  a  sacrifice, 
in  which  self-will  dies,  room  is  gained  within  for  God  the  Lord, 
whose  place  within  us  is  otherwise  occupied  by  the  selfish  desires, 
the  world  and  its  images. 

IT  The  launching  of  a  selfish  wish  into  the  unseen  world,  in 
the  dim  hope  that  it  will  become  operative  through  the  good- 
nature of  a  Being  who  has  infinite  power  to  do  as  He  will,  is  not 
in  any  sense  prayer  at  all,  for  it  is  not  offered  to  God  as  God ; — 
it  does  not  seriously  profess  to  desire  that  God  should  be  more 
and  more  in  the  universe,  and  selfish  creatures  less  and  less ;  it 
is  not,  in  short,  addressed  to  the  perfect  righteousness  and  perfect 
love,  but  only  to  the  most  potent  of  administrative  agencies ;  it 
is  directed,  not  to  the  infinite  purity,  but  to  a  mighty  Executive 

^  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays,  129. 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER      159 

of  the  universe,  and  would  be  addressed  to  that  mighty  Executive 
much  more  hopefully  if  infinite  good-nature  instead  of  goodness 
were  His  essence.  Now  this  is  certainly  not,  in  Christ's  sense, 
prayer  at  all.  In  His  sense,  it  is  of  the  very  essence  of  prayer 
that  it  aims  at  the  establishment  of  the  Divine  will,  and  the 
annihilation  of  all  that  is  inconsistent  with  that  will.  It  is  not 
to  God's  omnipotence  primarily,  but  to  His  spiritual  nature,  that 
Christian  prayer  is  addressed  ;  the  whole  purport  of  it  being  that 
the  unity  of  the  Divine  Kingdom  may  be  asserted  and  its  laws 
established.  If  this  be  not  the  first  condition  of  any  petition, 
then  in  the  Christian  sense  that  petition  is  not  prayer  at  all. 
Prayer  is  not  a  short  and  easy  cut  to  the  thing  next  your  heart ; 
but  the  chief  method  by  which  the  eager  and  short-sighted 
and  imperfect  mind  gradually  learns  to  purify  itself  in  the 
flame  of  Divine  love.^ 

II. 

In  the  Name  of  Christ. 

In  the  parting  words  of  Christ  to  His  disciples  He  gave  them 
His  most  important  lesson  concerning  prayer.  He  fastened  to 
their  prayer  an  amazing  possibility  in  the  expressions  "  whatso- 
ever," "  anything,"  "  what  ye  will " ;  but  a  new  and  necessary 
element  was  disclosed  to  them  in  these  last  hours.  They  had 
been  taught  to  pray  and  how  to  pray,  but  not  to  pray  in  His 
name.  This  was  henceforth  to  be  their  plea  and  their  power. 
They  were  unworthy ;  He  was  worthy.  This  was  to  be  their 
confidence.  That  name  would  forever  be  recognized  at  the  throne 
and  would  always  assure  the  answer.  Prayer  now  depends  upon 
the  right  use  of  His  name.  That  signature  attached  makes  the 
prayer  pass  in  the  commerce  of  heaven. 

There  are  three  great  ideas  associated  with  the  words  "  in  My 
name  ".  We  pray  in  the  name  of  Christ  (1)  when  we  rely  on 
the  redemption  that  He  has  wrought  for  us ;  (2)  when  we  have 
the  spirit  of  Christ  and  seek  the  things  which  He  seeks ;  and  (3) 
when  we  are  in  vital  union  with  Him. 

1.  It  was  in  the  power  of  the  ritual  sacrifice  that  the  high 
priest  in  Israel  passed  through  the  veil  on  the  day  of  atonement. 
It  is  in  the  power  of  the  accepted  offering  of  the  Lamb  of  Divine 

*  R.  H.  Hutton,  Aspects  of  Religious  and  Scientific  Thought,  246. 


i6o    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

appointment  that  we  are  privileged  to  come  into  the  presence  of 
God.  "  Having  therefore,  brethren,  boldness  to  enter  into  the 
holy  place  by  the  blood  of  Jesus,  by  the  way  which  he  dedicated 
for  us,  a  new  and  living  way,  through  the  veil,  that  is  to  say,  his 
flesh ;  and  having  a  great  priest  over  the  house  of  God ;  let  us 
draw  near  with  a  true  heart  in  fulness  of  faith,  having  our 
hearts  sprinkled  from  an  evil  conscience,  and  our  body  washed 
with  pure  water ;  let  us  hold  fast  the  confession  of  our  hope  that 
it  waver  not ;  for  he  is  faithful  that  promised."  Not  only  has 
the  Son  of  God  bridged  the  chasm  of  nature  by  becoming  Son  of 
man,  but  as  Son  of  man,  representative  of  our  common  humanity, 
He  takes  upon  Him  the  awful  burden  of  human  guilt,  gathers  it 
about  His  holy  life,  feels  the  sting  of  it  as  none  but  a  sinless  soul 
could  feel  it.  If  any  one  suggests  a  difficulty  about  this,  let  him 
think  of  Moses  in  the  idolatrous  camp  of  Israel,  the  one  man 
entirely  innocent  being  the  one  man  of  all  the  multitude  who 
felt  the  guilt  to  be  intolerable.  So  it  was  that  the  Son  of  God 
felt  the  guilt  of  our  sins  as  none  but  His  sinless  soul  could  feel  it. 
What  a  Nessus'  shirt  He  wears  that  day,  as  He  accepts  sin's 
righteous  condemnation,  welcomes  the  sentence  of  God's  righteous 
law  upon  it,  dies,  the  Just  for  the  unjust,  takes  away  the  sin  of 
the  world  to  bury  it  in  His  grave,  and  rises  victorious  over  sin 
and  death,  having  exchanged  the  lamentable  cry,  "  My  God,  my 
God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me?"  for  the  glad  utterance, 
"Father,  into  thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit".  All  this  He 
does  as  Son  of  man,  as  representing  us  if  we  will  have  Him,  as 
the  forerunner  of  all  who  will  follow  Him,  entering  into  the  pre- 
sence of  God  for  us,  and  inviting  us  to  enter  into  the  presence  of 
God  with  Him  by  the  way  He  has  opened  for  us :  "  through  him 
we  both  have  access  by  one  Spirit  unto  the  Father  ".  The  enmity 
is  gone.     We  are  "  reconciled  to  God  by  the  death  of  his  Son  ". 

IT  Suppose  that  I,  a  sinner,  be  walking  along  yon  golden 
street,  passing  by  one  angel  after  another.  I  can  hear  them  say 
as  I  pass  through  their  ranks,  "  A  sinner !  a  crimson  sinner ! " 
Should  my  feet  totter  ?  Should  my  eye  grow  dim  ?  No ;  I  can 
say  to  them,  "  Yes,  a  sinner,  a  crimson  sinner,  but  a  sinner 
brought  near  by  a  forsaken  Saviour,  and  now  a  sinner  who  has 
boldness  to  enter  into  the  Holies  through  the  blood  of  Jesus  ".^ 

*  A.  A.  Bonar,  Heavenly  Springs,  176. 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER    i6i 

IF  I  recall  distinctly  a  certain  section  of  this  country  where  I 
was  for  awhile,  and  very  rarely  did  I  hear  Jesus'  name  used  in 
prayer.  I  heard  men  that  I  knew  must  be  good  men  praying 
in  church,  in  prayer-meeting  and  elsewhere  with  no  mention  of 
Jesus.  Let  us  distinctly  bear  in  mind  that  we  have  no  standing 
with  God  except  through  Jesus.  If  the  keenest  lawyer  of  London, 
who  knew  much  of  American  law,  and  of  Illinois  statute,  and  of 
Chicago  ordinance — suppose  such  a  one  were  to  come  here,  could 
he  plead  a  case  in  your  court-house  ?  You  know  he  could  not. 
He  would  have  no  legal  standing  here.  Now  you  and  I  have  no 
standing  at  yonder  bar.  We  are  disbarred  through  sin.  Only 
as  we  come  through  One  who  has  recognized  standing  there  can 
we  come.^ 

IF  No  one  truly  prays  who  does  not  pray  in  the  freedom  of 
Christ's  life,  and  work,  and  death.  The  measure  of  faith  in  His 
merits  and  sacrifice  will  be  found  to  be  the  measure  of  prayer  in 
the  case  of  any  individual  or  of  any  Church.  The  two  great 
branches  of  our  Lord's  family  differ  so  widely  as  to  all  which  con- 
stitutes the  government  and  administration  of  Divine  grace,  that 
any  communion  between  them,  except  that  of  charity,  is  little 
short  of  an  intellectual  impossibility.  But  the  Catholic  and  the 
Protestant  are  at  one  as  regards  redemption.  Each  agrees  as  to 
the  facts  of  man's  fall,  and  sin,  and  need.  Each  for  his  restora- 
tion relies  upon  the  supernatural  help  which  Christ's  work  for 
man  obtained ;  therefore,  though  these  two  may  misunderstand 
and  misrepresent  the  other,  they  are  none  the  less  brethren. 

See, 
Their  speech  is  one,  their  witnesses  agree. 

Each  believes,  each  loves,  each  prays,  and  that  from  the  very 
depth  and  ground  of  the  heart.  And,  as  regards  any  individual 
member  of  either  communion,  we  shall  find  that  it  is  the  sight  of 
the  cross,  and  of  all  the  tremendous  associations  that  are  bound 
up  with  it — the  sense  of  guilt,  of  condemnation,  of  deliverance, 
of  infinite  loss,  and  everlasting  gain, — that  brings,  that  binds  the 
soul  to  prayer.2 

2.  To  pray  in  the  name  of  Christ  is  to  pray  in  His  spirit, 
according  to  His  mind.  It  means  that  we  pray  for  such  things 
as  will  promote  Christ's  Kingdom.  When  we  do  anything  in 
another's  name  it  is  for  him  we  do  it.      When  we  take  possession 

^  S.  D.  Gordon,  Qui&t  Talks  on  Prayer,  156. 
'  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays,  124. 
II 


i62  THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

of  a  property,  of  a  legacy  in  the  name  of  some  society,  it  is  not 
for  our  own  private  advantage  but  for  the  society  we  take  pos- 
session. Yet  how  constantly  do  we  overlook  this  obvious  con- 
dition of  acceptable  prayer  !  To  pray  in  Christ's  name  is  to  seek 
what  He  seeks,  to  ask  aid  in  promoting  what  He  has  at  heart. 
To  come  in  Christ's  name  and  plead  selfish  and  worldly  aims  is 
absurd.  To  pray  in  Christ's  name  is  to  pray  in  the  spirit  in 
which  He  Himself  prayed  and  for  objects  He  desires.  When  we 
measure  our  prayers  by  this  rule  we  cease  to  wonder  that  so  few 
seem  to  be  answered.  Is  God  to  answer  prayers  that  positively 
lead  men  away  from  Him  ?  Is  He  to  build  them  up  in  the 
presumption  that  happiness  can  be  found  in  the  pursuit  of  selfish 
objects  and  worldly  comfort  ?  It  is  when  a  man  stands  detached 
from  worldly  hopes  and  finding  all  in  Christ,  so  clearly  appre- 
hending the  sweep  and  benignity  of  Christ's  will  as  to  see  that  it 
comprehends  all  good  to  man,  and  that  life  can  serve  no  purpose 
if  it  do  not  help  to  fulfil  that  will — it  is  then  a  man  prays  with 
assurance  and  finds  his  prayer  answered 

Such  prayer  involves  intelligent,  loving,  enthusiastic  co-opera- 
tion with  His  purpose :  growing  interest  in  all  the  higher  com- 
munications of  His  truth ;  perseverance  in  sustaining  the  character 
and  the  work  begun  by  His  grace,  so  that  the  result  of  both  may 
continue  from  generation  to  generation,  when  our  own  service, 
necessarily  incomplete,  is  ended  here ;  joy  in  seeing  each  measure 
of  success,  wheresoever  it  be,  granted  to  that  work.  It  was  to 
His  friends  and  neighbours  that  the  Good  Shepherd  said,  "  Re- 
joice with  me,  for  I  have  found  my  sheep  which  was  lost". 
Comprehension,  then,  of  the  purpose  of  Christ,  a  spiritual  imagina- 
tion large  enough  to  embrace  a  portion,  at  least,  of  His  plans,  a 
growth  of  love  able  to  sympathize,  a  ready  will  to  co-operate 
must  accompany  prayer  in  His  name. 

IF  There  is  a  law  pertaining  to  human  nature  which  demands 
that  there  should  be  active  co-operation  on  our  part  before  the 
beneficent  purposes  of  God  can  be  fulfilled.  Jesus  taught  us  to 
pray  *'  Thy  will  be  done  in  earth,  as  it  is  in  heaven  ".  He  knew 
that  it  was  possible  for  the  Divine  will  to  remain  undone,  or  even 
to  be  frustrated  by  the  indifference  or  rebellion  of  man.  As  we 
grow  and  mature,  God  calls  us  increasingly  to  enter  into  His  life 
and  share  His  plans  and  operations.  He  takes  us  into  His 
counsels,  imparts  to  us  His  thoughts,  and  asks  us  to  become  His 
agents.     There  are  two  ways  in  which  He  does  this,     Sometimes 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER    163 

there  comes  to  us,  all  unsought,  a  revelation  of  His  mind  and  will 
regarding  something  He  would  have  us  desire  or  do.  To  the  eye 
of  faith  the  vision  is  clear.  The  Transcendent  God  has  for  a 
moment  lifted  the  overhanging  veil  of  mystery  and  made  His 
purpose  plain.  But  only  on  rare  occasions  does  He  thus  reveal 
Himself,  else  the  human  faculty  of  seeing  would  atrophy  without 
its  appropriate  exercise.  His  ordinary  means  of  guiding  our 
thoughts  and  acts  is  by  His  indwelling.  He  is  the  Immanent 
God,  and  He  would  have  us  learn  more  and  more  to  see  Him  in 
ourselves — to  take  our  own  thoughts,  desires,  aims,  as  the  off- 
spring of  His,  confident  that  He  will  not  betray  the  trusting 
heart  in  which  both  by  nature  and  by  grace  He  dwells.^ 

IF  "Do  not  try  planning  and  praying  and  then  planning 
again  ;  it  is  not  honouring  to  God,"  wrote  General  Gordon.  And 
it  would  be  hard  to  measure  how  much  of  the  extraordinary 
power  of  his  life  was  due  to  this — that  there  was  no  reserve  in 
his  committal  of  himself  to  God ;  that  he  lived  with  an  undivided 
trust ;  that  he  had  marked  and  judged  and  dealt  with  the  tempta- 
tion to  half-heartedness  in  prayer.^ 

3.  But  prayer  in  Christ's  name  also  implies  union  with  Christ 
and  identification  of  interests.  This  it  is  that  the  Saviour  Him- 
self emphasizes  when  He  says  :  "  If  ye  abide  in  me,  and  my  words 
abide  in  you,  ye  shall  ask  what  ye  will,  and  it  shall  be  done  unto 
you"  (John  xv.  7).  Of  this,  too,  the  Apostle  John  says:  '* Be- 
loved, if  our  heart  condemn  us  not,  then  have  we  confidence 
toward  God.  And  whatsoever  we  ask,  we  receive  of  him,  because 
we  keep  his  commandments,  and  do  those  things  that  are  pleasing 
in  his  sight.  And  this  is  his  commandment.  That  we  should 
believe  on  the  name  of  his  Son  Jesus  Christ,  and  love  one  another, 
as  he  gave  us  commandment.  And  he  that  keepeth  his  com- 
mandments dwelleth  in  him,  and  he  in  him.  And  hereby  we 
know  that  he  abideth  in  us,  by  the  Spirit  which  he  hath  given 
us"  (1  Johniii.  21-24). 

What  is  it  to  abide  in  Christ  ?  That  is  the  first  question  in 
settling  the  qualities  of  him  who  can  hope  to  pray  successfully. 
The  phrase  becomes  familiar  to  us  in  the  New  Testament ;  and 
indeed  we  might  find  a  parallel  that  would  explain  it  to  us  in 
j^everal  of  the  different  kinds  of  relation  that  exist  between  human 

1  L.  Swetenham,  Conquering  Prayer,  139.  "  Francis  Paget. 


i64  THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

beings.  For  instance,  we  should  probably  all  understand  what 
was  meant  if  it  were  said  of  a  young  and  dutiful  child  that  he 
abode  or  lived  in  his  parents.  The  child's  earliest  years  are  so 
completely  hidden  behind  the  parents'  life  that  you  look  upon 
him  not  altogether  as  a  separate  individuality,  but  rather  as 
almost  a  part  of  the  same  organism,  one  expression  of  the  parents* 
nature  ;  so  that,  just  as  the  arm,  the  tongue,  the  eye,  are  several 
media  for  the  expression  of  the  parents'  will,  in  the  same  way, 
though  in  a  higher  degree,  the  child  is  another  limb  of  the  parental 
life  and  utterance  of  the  parental  nature.  The  law  owns  this, 
and  reaches  the  child  only  through  the  parent.  We  all  expect 
children's  opinions  on  matters  of  religion,  of  politics,  of  taste,  to 
be  echoes  of  their  parents'.  The  father  acts  and  thinks  for  the 
child.  The  child  acts  and  thinks  in  the  father.  Thus,  until  the 
time  when  the  gradual  departure  takes  place,  the  child's  home  is 
not  merely  in  his  father's  house,  but  in  his  father's  character — he 
abides  in  him.  Or  take  another  case  :  the  army  and  the  common 
soldier  " abide  in"  the  general.  The  army  does  what  its  general 
does.  As  an  army,  it  has  no  thought  or  action  out  of  him.  It 
moves  when  he  moves,  stops  moving  when  he  stops  moving.  We 
say  the  general  has  gone  here  and  there,  and  we  mean  the  army 
has  gone.  It  lays  aside  all  faculty  of  decision,  or  rather  con- 
tributes it  all  to  him,  and  he  with  the  combined  responsibility  of 
the  great  multitude  upon  him  goes  his  way,  carrying  their  life  in 
his.  That  is  perhaps  the  most  complete  and  absolute  identifica- 
tion of  two  lives  that  it  is  possible  to  conceive  of. 

IT  We  all  know  with  what  confidence  the  clerk  of  a  business 
house  goes  to  a  bank  with  a  draft  "  in  the  name  "  of  his  firm. 
If  he  were  to  present  it  in  his  own  name,  that  would  be  a  very 
different  affair.  The  demand  made  on  behalf  of  the  firm  is 
instantly  honoured.  We  can  see  that  there  is  all  the  difference 
in  this  instance  between  acting  in  a  private  and  acting  in  a  public 
capacity.  To  ask  as  belonging  to  a  business  corporation  for  the 
purposes  of  that  corporation  is  one  thing.  To  ask  as  a  private 
individual,  with  merely  personal  ends  in  view,  is  quite  another 
thing.  Shall  we  be  wrong  if  we  say  that  Christ  meant  us  to 
understand  that  whatever  we  ask  as  connected  with  Him,  as  be- 
longing to  Him,  as  members  of  the  Body  which  is  identified  with 
Him,  and  which  has  the  right  to  use  His  name,  would  be  given  to 
us  ?     Some  one  has  said  that  "  to  ask  in  Christ's  name  is  to  ask 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER     165 

with  Christ's  authority  for  what  He  would  ask  ".     We  are  not 
likely  to  arrive  at  a  better  definition  than  that.^ 

(1)  Such  a  use  of  the  name  of  a  person  may  be  in  virtue  of  a 
legal  union.  A  merchant  leaving  his  home  and  business  gives 
his  chief  clerk  a  general  power,  by  which  he  can  draw  thousands 
of  pounds  in  the  merchant's  name.  The  clerk  does  this,  not  for 
himself,  but  only  in  the  interests  of  the  business.  It  is  because 
the  merchant  knows  and  trusts  him  as  wholly  devoted  to  his 
interests  and  business  that  he  dares  put  his  name  and  property 
at  his  command.  When  the  Lord  Jesus  went  to  heaven,  He  left 
His  work,  the  management  of  His  kingdom  on  earth,  in  the  hands 
of  His  servants.  He  could  not  do  otherwise  than  give  them  also 
His  name  to  draw  all  the  supplies  they  needed  for  the  due  con- 
duct of  His  business.  And  they  have  the  spiritual  power  to 
avail  themselves  of  the  name  of  Jesus  just  to  the  extent  to  which 
they  yield  themselves  to  live  only  for  the  interests  and  the  work 
of  the  Master.  The  use  of  the  name  always  supposes  the  sur- 
render of  our  interests  to  Him  whom  we  represent. 

(2)  Or  such  a  use  of  the  name  may  be  in  virtue  of  a  life 
union.  In  the  case  of  the  merchant  and  his  clerk,  the  union  is 
temporary.  But  we  know  how  oneness  of  life  on  earth  gives 
oneness  of  name :  a  child  has  the  father's  name  because  he  has 
his  life.  And  often  the  child  of  a  good  father  has  been  honoured 
or  helped  by  others  for  the  sake  of  the  name  he  bore.  But  this 
would  not  last  long  if  it  were  found  that  it  was  only  a  name 
and  that  the  father's  character  was  wanting.  The  name  and  the 
character  or  spirit  must  be  in  harmony.  When  such  is  the  case, 
the  child  will  have  a  double  claim  on  the  father's  friends ;  the 
character  secures  and  increases  the  love  and  esteem  rendered 
first  for  the  name's  sake.  So  it  is  with  Jesus  and  the  believer : 
we  are  one,  we  have  one  life,  one  Spirit  with  Him  ;  for  this 
reason  we  may  come  in  His  name.  Our  power  in  using  that 
name,  whether  with  God,  or  men,  or  devils,  depends  on  the 
measure  of  our  spiritual  life-union.  The  use  of  the  Name  rests 
on  the  unity  of  life ;  the  name  and  the  Spirit  of  Jesus  are  one. 

(3)  Or  the  union  that  empowers  to  the  use  of  the  name  may 
be  the  union  of  love.     When  a  bride  becomes  united  to  the 

1  A.  W.  Robinson,  The  Voice  of  Joy  and  Health,  68. 


166    THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

bridegroom,  she  gives  up  her  own  name,  to  be  called  by  his,  and 
has  now  the  full  right  to  use  it.  She  purchases  in  his  name,  and 
that  name  is  not  refused.  And  this  is  done  because  the  bride- 
groom has  chosen  her  for  himself,  counting  on  her  to  care  for  his 
interests  ;  they  are  now  one.  And  so  the  Heavenly  Bridegroom 
could  do  nothing  less ;  having  loved  us  and  made  us  one  with 
Himself,  what  could  He  do  but  give  those  who  bear  His  name 
the  right  to  present  it  before  the  Father,  or  to  come  with  it  to 
Himself  for  all  they  need  ?  And  there  is  no  one  who  gives  him- 
self really  to  live  in  the  name  of  Jesus  who  does  not  receive  in 
ever-increasing  measure  the  spiritual  capacity  to  ask  and  re- 
ceive in  that  name  what  he  will.  The  bearing  of  the  name  of 
another  supposes  my  having  given  up  my  own,  and  with  it  my 
own  independent  life  ;  but  then,  as  surely,  my  possession  of  all 
there  is  in  the  name  I  have  taken  instead  of  my  own. 

IF  "  Prayer  in  the  name  of  Christ,"  though  essentially  a  mystical 
phrase,  also  contains  a  surface  meaning  which  is  very  valuable  to 
those  who  grasp  and  apply  it.  And  there  are  many  who  in  their 
use  of  the  words  attach  this  very  definite  meaning  to  them.  They 
are  aware  that  name  in  olden  days  stood  for  character.  Hence 
prayer  in  the  name  of  Christ  signifies  to  them  prayer  in  the  name 
or  character  of  Christ  involving  the  elimination  from  their  sup- 
plications of  all  that  is  foreign  to  His  nature,  and  the  inclusion 
of  all  those  virtues  and  ideals  He  taught  and  exemplified — in  a 
word,  it  is  prayer  in  the  holy  and  obedient  spirit  of  Jesus.  Any 
demand  upon  life  thus  based  upon  the  name  or  character  of  Jesus 
cannot  fail  to  be  according  to  the  will  of  God — thereby  fulfilling 
one  of  the  conditions  laid  down  for  effectual  prayer.  The  more 
Jesus  becomes  our  standard  and  inspiration  in  prayer  the  more 
confident  we  may  be  of  a  favourable  hearing.  This  is  surely 
what  He  meant  by  the  words,  "  If  ye  abide  in  me  and  my  words 
abide  in  you,  ye  shall  ask  what  ye  will  and  it  shall  be  done  unto 
you".i 

IF  To  attain  that  holy  abiding  in  which  there  is  such  a  perfect 
community  of  life  with  our  true  Vine  that  it  is  as  impossible  for 
us  to  ask  amiss  as  for  the  branch  of  the  fig-tree  to  put  forth  the 
buds  and  flowers  of  the  thorn  is,  as  we  all  confess,  to  reach  the 
very  highest  ideal  of  discipleship.  And  yet  on  nothing  short  of 
this  perfectness  of  union  with  our  Lord  has  He  predicated  an  un- 
restricted access  to  the  treasuries  of  Divine  blessing.     The  same 

^  L.  Swetenham,  Conquering  Prayer^  169. 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER     167 

condition  is  affixed  to  each  of  the  highest  and  most  longed-for 
attainments  of  the  Christian  life — sinlessness,  fruitfulness,  and 
prevalence  in  prayer ;  namely,  "  If  ye  abide  in  me  "} 

III. 

In  the  Power  of  the  Spirit. 

Prayer  offered  in  the  name  of  Christ  and  the  action  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  in  prayer  are  so  closely  linked,  one  with  the  other,  that  the 
former  truth  involves  the  latter.  The  sacred  humanity  of  the 
Saviour  received  in  the  Incarnation  itself  the  anointing  of  the 
Holy  Ghost ;  at  the  Baptism  there  was  a  further  anointing ;  once 
again,  at  His  Ascension,  the  anointing  was  repeated.  The  same 
Spirit  by  which  the  manhood  of  the  incarnate  Lord  has  been 
moulded  into  what  it  is  passes  into  His  members ;  every  part  of 
their  redeemed  nature  is  pervaded  by  His  presence  ;  through  His 
strength  enabling  their  wills  to  respond  to  the  Divine  will,  through 
His  illumination  developing  their  spiritual  insight,  through  His 
gift  of  love  enkindling  their  affections,  they  realize  their  true 
selves  as  God  ever  intended  them  to  be.  The  result  is  that  Christ 
Himself  is  revealed  and  formed  within  them.  To  glorify  the 
Son  who  sends  Him  is  the  Spirit's  loftiest  task.  In  effecting  the 
vital  union  of  the  glorified  Head  with  the  members  of  His  Body, 
of  the  branches  in  the  Vine  and  the  Vine  in  the  branches,  that 
function  of  the  Holy  Ghost  in  man  is  accomplished. 

To  understand  how  the  coming  of  the  Holy  Spirit  was  indeed 
to  commence  a  new  epoch  in  the  prayer-world,  we  must  remember 
who  He  is,  what  His  work,  and  what  the  significance  of  His  not 
being  given  until  Jesus  was  glorified.  It  is  in  the  Spirit  that 
God  exists,  for  He  is  Spirit.  It  is  in  the  Spirit  that  the  Son 
was  begotten  of  the  Father;  it  is  in  the  fellowship  of  the 
Spirit  that  the  Father  and  Son  are  one.  The  eternal,  never-ceas- 
ing giving  to  the  Son,  which  is  the  Father's  prerogative,  and  the 
eternal  asking  and  receiving,  which  is  the  Son's  right  and  blessed- 
ness— it  is  through  the  Spirit  that  this  communion  of  life  and 
love  is  maintained.  It  has  been  so  from  all  eternity.  It  is  so 
specially  now,  when  the  Son  as  Mediator  ever  liveth  to  pray. 
The  great  work  which  Jesus  began  on  earth,  of  reconciling  in  His 

1  A.  J.  Gordon,  In  Christ,  137. 


i68   THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

own  body  God  and  man,  He  carries  on  in  heaven.  To  accomplish 
this  He  took  up  into  His  person  the  conflict  between  God's  right- 
eousness and  our  sin.  On  the  cross  He  once  for  all  ended  the 
struggle  in  His  own  body.  And  then  He  ascended  to  heaven, 
that  thence  He  might  in  each  member  of  His  body  carry  out  the 
deliverance  and  manifest  the  victory  He  had  obtained.  It  is  to 
do  this  that  He  ever  liveth  to  pray ;  in  His  unceasing  intercession 
He  places  Himself  in  living  fellowship  with  the  unceasing  prayer 
of  His  redeemed  ones.  Or  rather,  it  is  His  unceasing  intercession 
which  shows  itself  in  their  prayers,  and  gives  them  a  power  they 
never  had  before.     And  He  does  this  through  the  Holy  Spirit. 

1.  The  Spirit  assures  us  of  the  nearness  and  power  of  Christ 
Himself.  It  was  this  that  Jesus  taught  His  disciples  on  that 
same  night  when  He  told  them  that  those  who  had  seen  Him  had 
seen  the  Father.  Much  was  said  during  those  sacred  hours  of  the 
Spirit  who  was  to  come  when  Jesus  Himself  should  be  seen  no 
more.  Why  did  He  speak  thus  of  that  Spirit  ?  It  is  reasonable 
to  think  that  it  was,  in  the  main,  a  practical  purpose  which  He 
had  in  view.  He  was  about  to  leave  His  disciples,  and  they  were 
miserable  at  the  thought  of  losing  Him.  They  would  be  like 
orphans  in  a  desolate  world  if  He  were  gone.  The  sun  would 
have  vanished  out  of  their  sky.  And,  reading  their  thoughts, 
He  tried  to  reassure  them.  They  were  not  to  be  troubled  or 
afraid.  It  would  not  be  as  they  were  fearing.  For,  in  the  first 
place,  if  He  were  leaving  them,  it  was  only  that  He  might  make 
ready  for  them  in  a  House  in  which  there  would  be  ample  room 
for  them  as  well  as  for  Him.  And,  next,  they  were  to  understand 
that,  though  He  might  leave  them  for  a  little  while,  He  would 
come  again  in  another  Form,  and  dwell  with  them,  and  within 
them,  in  fellowship  yet  dearer  and  more  intimate  than  anything 
they  had  known  in  the  happy  days  which  now  were  coming  to 
an  end.  The  Spirit  who  was  of  Himself,  and  who  was  Himself, 
should  be  their  abiding  Guest.  Unseen  by  any  mortal  eye.  He 
yet  would  ever  be  by  their  side  and  nearer  than  by  their  side,  a 
Helper  and  a  Comforter  whose  home  should  be  in  the  most  secret 
chamber  of  their  being.  If  any  man  would  be  obedient,  Jesus 
and  the  Father  would  come,  and  would  take  up  their  abode 
with  that  man.     Why  should  they  be  disconsolate  ?     They  would 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER     169 

never  be  left  alone.  The  Father  would  be  with  them.  The  Son 
would  be  with  them,  who,  as  their  Human  Friend  and  Lord,  had 
interpreted  the  Father.  Father  and  Son  would  be  with  them  in 
the  presence  of  that  Spirit  who  could  never  be  separated  from 
either. 

The  presence  then  promised,  now  realized  through  the  Spirit, 
is  the  Emmanuel-presence,  Divine  and  human.  It  is  the  presence 
that,  in  ways  appropriate  to  each,  gives  its  life  to  the  word,  to 
the  sacraments,  to  prayer  in  public  and  private,  to  the  ministry 
in  the  Church.  It  is  the  presence  that  constitutes  the  Christian 
standing  before  God,  and  forms  the  character  into  correspondence 
with  ''  the  mind  of  Christ,"  which  is  the  condition  of  asking  in 
His  name.  In  the  teaching  of  St.  Paul,  those  "in  whom  the 
Spirit  of  God  dwells"  are  those  "in  whom  Christ  is";  those 
who  are  in  Christ  Jesus,  and  are  owned  as  His,  are  those  who 
have  "the  Spirit  of  Christ".  Such  was  the  Apostle's  conviction 
as,  under  the  guidance  of  the  Paraclete,  he  developed  and  applied 
the  Lord's  own  revelation  in  passages  saturated  with  inspiration. 
The  presence  of  the  assisting  Spirit,  the  presence  also  of  "  Christ 
Jesus  .  .  .  who  maketh  intercession  for  us,"  coincident  and  in- 
separable— this  is  the  basis  of  teaching  instinct  with  energy, 
hope,  and  stability  respecting  the  action  of  the  Holy  Spirit  in 
prayer. 

Lord,  I  have  shut  my  door ! 
Come  Thou  and  visit  me ;  I  am  alone  ! 
Come,  as  when  doors  were  shut.  Thou  cam'st  of  yore. 

And  visitedst  Thine  own. 
My  Lord,  I  kneel  with  reverent  love  and  fear, 

For  Thou  art  here. 

2.  The  Spirit  gives  us  confidence  in  our  approach,  by  witness- 
ing to  our  sonship.  Twice  in  St.  Paul's  Epistles  there  is  a 
remarkable  reference  to  Him  in  the  matter  of  prayer.  "  Ye 
received  the  spirit  of  adoption,  whereby  we  cry,  Abba,  Father  " 
(Rom.  viii.  15).  "  God  hath  sent  forth  the  Spirit  of  his  Son  into 
your  hearts,  crying,  Abba,  Father  "  (Gal.  iv.  6).  In  that  name 
our  Saviour  offered  His  greatest  prayer  to  the  Father,  accompanied 
by  the  entire  surrender  and  sacrifice  of  His  life  and  love.  The 
Holy  Spirit  is  given  for  the  express  purpose  of  teaching  us, 


170  THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

from  the  very  beginning  of  our  Christian  life  onward,  to  utter 
that  word  in  childlike  trust  and  surrender.  In  one  of  these 
passages  we  read,  "  We  cry  "  ;  in  the  other,  "  He  cries  ".  What 
a  wonderful  blending  of  the  Divine  and  the  human  co-operation 
in  prayer.  What  a  proof  that  God  has  done  His  utmost  to  make 
prayer  as  natural  and  effectual  as  though  it  were  the  cry  of  a 
child  to  an  earthly  Father,  as  He  says,  **  Abba,  Father  ". 

IF  Ahba,  the  Syrian  vocative  for  father,  was  a  word  familiar 
to  the  lips  of  Jesus.  No  one  had  hitherto  approached  God  as  He 
did.  His  utterance  of  this  word,  expressing  the  attitude  of  His 
life  of  prayer  and  breathing  the  whole  spirit  of  His  religion,  pro- 
foundly affected  His  disciples.  So  that  the  Abba  of  Jesus  became 
a  watchword  of  His  Church,  being  the  prayer  name  of  the  God 
and  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  Gentile  believers  pro- 
nounced it,  conscious  that  in  doing  so  they  were  joined  in  spirit 
to  the  Lord  who  said,  "  My  Father,  and  your  Father  !  "  Greek- 
speaking  Christians  supplemented  it  by  their  own  equivalent,  as 
we  by  the  English  Father.  This  precious  vocable  is  carried 
down  the  ages  and  round  the  whole  world  in  the  mother-tongue 
of  Jesus,  a  memorial  of  the  hour  when  through  Him  men  learned 
to  call  God  Father } 

3.  This  sense  of  sonship  is,  then,  a  sense  of  oneness  with  the 
other  members  of  the  Body  of  Christ.  In  the  light  of  the  com- 
mon prayer,  "  Abba,  Father,"  we  can  hardly  doubt  that  it  was  in 
acts  of  earnest,  corporate  worship  that  this  intercession  of  the 
Spirit  made  itself  felt  in  the  Apostolic  age.  Such,  for  instance, 
was  that  act  of  worship  described  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles, 
consequent  on  the  return  of  St.  Peter  and  St.  John  from  their 
examination  before  the  Council,  followed  by  a  renewed  manifesta- 
tion of  Christian  self-sacrifice  and  Christian  energy;  such  also 
that  solemn  "ministration  to  the  Lord,"  during  which  the  Holy 
Ghost  made  known  His  will :  "  Separate  me  Barnabas  and  Saul 
for  the  work  whereunto  I  have  called  them  " ;  and  then,  after  a 
new  and  special  act  of  fasting  and  prayer.  He  bade  the  officers  of 
the  Church  send  them  on  their  mission.  Probably  if  attendance 
at  our  own  public  worship  were  characterized  by  greater  earnest- 
ness, more  expectancy,  a  deeper  desire  to  set  forth  the  Divine 
glory,  it  would  be  in  the  great  congregation,  chiefly  at  the  Holy 

1  G.  G.  Findlay,  The  Epistle  to  the  Oalatians,  253. 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER      171 

Communion,  though  at  other  acts  of  corporate  praise,  thanksgiv- 
ing, and  intercession  also,  that  the  presence  of  the  interceding 
Spirit  would  be  realized.  Into  prayer  new  energy  and  interest 
would  be  infused ;  into  the  worshippers  there  would  enter  a  de- 
sire so  to  consecrate  their  lives  that  the  Kingdom  of  God  might 
be  extended,  and  the  lofty  hope  of  the  Second  Advent  might  be 
fulfilled. 

IT  A  *'  belief  in  the  Holy  Catholic  Church  "  should  react  on  our 
religious  life  in  several  beneficial  ways.  It  should  give  us  a 
lively  sense  of  gratitude  to  our  predecessors  in  the  Christian 
faith  and  a  sense  of  the  unbroken  continuity  of  the  Christian  life 
in  all  ages.  We  need  to  remember  how  continuous  has  been  the 
spiritual  life  in  the  Church,  and  how  a  long-sufiering  God  has 
borne  with  the  faults  and  superstitions  which  in  every  age  have 
adhered  to  its  organization.  The  more  vivid  and  the  farther- 
reaching  is  our  impression  of  the  patience  of  the  wooing  Spirit  of 
God,  the  deeper  will  be  our  personal  sense  of  obligation,  the  more 
truly  "  evangelical "  our  spirit.  For  it  is  just  the  sense  of  infinite 
debt  to  the  Supreme,  "  the  habit  of  grace,"  it  is  just  this  that  is 
the  dominant  note  in  the  Christian  life  everywhere :  the  universal 
Church  of  Jesus  is  one  vast  Brotherhood  of  Infinite  Obligation. 
The  thought  of  the  vastness,  variety,  duration,  and  essential 
unity  of  the  common  life  to  which  we  belong  if  we  be  members 
of  Christ's  Body,  the  Church,  should  impose  upon  us  a  sense  of 
responsibility  as  having  our  place  in  the  inheriting  and  transmis- 
sion of  that  common  life.  We  come  into  the  Christian  life,  not  as 
though  we  were  the  first  that  ever  burst  into  the  sea  of  Christian 
truth  and  feeling,  but  as  the  successors,  heirs,  and  debtors  of  a 
vast  company  who  represent  the  purest,  sanest,  and  most  service- 
able element  in  the  life  of  humanity.  Every  one  of  us  who  is 
baptized  into  the  spirit  of  Jesus  is  the  successor  of  apostles,  con- 
fessors, martyrs,  monks,  evangelists,  reformers,  who  have  mediated 
the  Christian  view-point  and  temper — and,  better  still,  of  the 
great  anonymous  crowd  of  holy  men  who  have  lived  and  prayed, 
and  live  and  pray  now,  in  heaven,  in  the  Spirit  of  Jesus  Christ.^ 

4.  The  Spirit  intercedes  with  us,  transfiguring  our  prayer. 
How  inestimable  is  the  support  of  the  revelation  that  the  inter- 
ceding Spirit,  to  whom  as  God  the  mind  of  the  Godhead  is  known, 
takes  up  our  prayers,  in  themselves  so  unworthy,  and  so  inade- 
quate in  every  quality  which  prayer  should  possess,  supplies  their 

1  G.  A.  Johnston  Robs,  The  Ood  We  Trust,  163. 


172   THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

deficiencies,  inspires  them  with  "comfort,  life,  and  fire  of  love," 
and  unites  them  with  the  intercession  of  the  Mediator,  who  pre- 
sents them  to  the  Father.  In  gaining  this  supreme  benefit,  we 
find  ourselves  possessed  of  the  secret  of  effectual  prayer,  and  are 
on  the  way  to  be  delivered  from  all  perplexity  and  uncertainty 
in  our  supplications,  for  the  Holy  Spirit  is  our  Advocate  and 
Intercessor  within,  even  as  Christ  is  our  Intercessor  before  the 
throne  of  God ;  and  if  He  inspires  our  prayers,  we  may  in  offer- 
ing them  be  freed  from  all  misgivings  as  to  the  Divine  will  St. 
Paul's  language  is  very  clear  and  very  striking  on  this  point : 
"  The  Spirit  also  helpeth  our  infirmities  :  for  we  know  not  how  to 
pray  as  we  ought ;  but  the  Spirit  himself  maketh  intercession  for 
us  with  groanings  which  cannot  be  uttered ;  and  he  that  searcheth 
the  hearts  knoweth  what  is  the  mind  of  the  Spirit,  because  he 
maketh  intercession  for  the  saints  according  to  the  will  of  God  '^ 
If,  therefore,  we  are  filled,  as  we  may  be,  and  as  God  intends  us 
to  be,  with  the  Holy  Ghost,  we  may  expect  such  Divine  guidance 
in  our  prayers  as  shall  render  their  answer  certain.  For,  as  the 
Apostle  puts  the  matter  in  another  place,  "Who  among  men 
knoweth  the  things  of  a  man,  save  the  spirit  of  the  man  which 
is  in  him  ?  even  so  the  things  of  God  none  knoweth,  save  the 
Spirit  of  God.  But  we  received,  not  the  spirit  of  the  world,  but 
the  spirit  which  is  of  God ;  that  we  might  know  the  things  that 
are  freely  given  to  us  by  God." 

II  You  have  intimated  your  doubt  of  what  spirit  it  is  said 
that  he  "  maketh  intercession  for  us  with  groanings  which  cannot 
be  uttered  ".  Let  us  then  refer  to  what  has  gone  before,  that 
the  passage  may  make  plain  what  we  are  seeking.  Likewise,  it 
is  said  "  the  Spirit  helpeth  our  infirmities  ".  Does  it  not  seem  to 
you  that  this  is  the  Holy  Spirit,  for  He  is  our  Helper,  as  He  to 
whom  it  is  said,  "Thou  hast  been  my  succour,  leave  me  not 
neither  forsake  me,  O  God  of  my  salvation  !  "  For  what  other 
Spirit  could  teach  Paul  how  to  pray  ?  The  Spirit  of  Christ,  like 
Christ  Himself,  teaches  His  disciples  to  pray,  for  who  could 
teach  us,  after  Christ,  but  His  Spirit,  whom  He  sent  to  teach  us, 
and  to  direct  our  prayers,  "  for  we  pray  with  the  Spirit  and  we 
pray  with  the  understanding  also ".  That  the  understanding 
may  pray  well,  the  Spirit  goes  before  and  "  leads  it  forth  into 
the  right  way,"  so  as  to  prevent  carnal  things,  or  what  either 
falls  below  or  exceeds  its  strength,  from  secretly  stealing  over  it. 


THE  FIRST  PRINCIPLES  OF  PRAYER     173 

"  For  the  manifestation  of  the  Spirit  is  given  to  every  man  to 
profit  withal."  It  is  written  also,  Seek  great  things,  and  small 
things  shall  be  added  unto  you ;  seek  heavenly  things,  and  earthly 
things  shall  be  added  unto  you.^ 

IF  The  interceding  Spirit  is  in  Himself  perfectly  conscious  of 
God's  mind  and  purpose,  and  God  is  perfectly  conscious  of  His. 
He  intercedes  *' according  to  God  ".  This  intercession  is  but  a 
form  of  the  perfect  Divine  life.  But  in  the  heart  of  the  Church 
this  desire  of  the  Spirit  can  make  itself  felt  only  in  groanings 
for  the  Divine  manifestation  which,  like  the  aspirations  which 
music  suggests  or  expresses,  are  too  deep  to  admit  of  articulate 
utterance.  St.  Paul,  when  he  speaks  of  groanings  which  cannot 
be  put  into  words,  is  perhaps  thinking  of  the  "  tongues "  in 
which  the  spiritual  emotion  of  the  first  Christian  churches  found 
expression.  And  we  should  think  of  some  earnest  act  of  corporate 
Christian  worship  when,  under  the  workings  of  the  one  Spirit, 
the  strong  desire  after  what  is  holiest  and  highest  possesses  men, 
and  binds  them  together  with  a  sense  of  longing  for  the  Divine 
manifestation  which  could  not  be  put  into  definite  words.^ 

5.  The  Spirit  regenerates  our  nature,  and  that  in  all  its  parts 
— understanding,  feeling,  imagination,  will.  And  what  our 
prayer  can  do  depends  always  upon  what  we  are.  It  is  living 
in  the  name  of  Christ  that  is  the  secret  of  praying  in  the  name 
of  Christ ;  living  in  the  Spirit  that  fits  for  praying  in  the  Spirit. 
It  is  abiding  in  Christ  that  gives  the  right  and  power  to  ask 
what  we  will :  the  extent  of  the  abiding  is  the  exact  measure  of 
the  power  in  prayer.  It  is  the  Spirit  dwelling  within  us  that 
prays,  not  in  words  and  thoughts  always,  but  in  a  breathing  and 
a  being  deeper  than  utterance.  Just  so  much  as  there  is  of 
Christ's  Spirit  in  us,  is  there  real  prayer. 

IT  It  is  as  when  the  vessel  nearing  land  flings  its  rope  and 
finds  that  it  holds.  In  prayer  we  know  ourselves  in  contact  with 
a  higher  realm  of  things,  and  our  rope  holds.  Our  answer  is  the 
thing  we  want,  the  best  thing  there  is.  Not  words ;  for  what  are 
they  ?  Not  words,  but  what  is  so  much  better — the  inflowing  of 
peace,  a  sense  of  security,  the  feeling  of  a  near  Presence,  often 
an  inefiable  happiness.  Are  there  better  things  in  this  or  any 
world  than  these  ?     Prayer  is  the  soul's  contact  with  the  realm 

^  S.  Ambrose. 

^  Bishop  Gore,  St.  PauVs  Epistle  to  the  Romans,  i.  313. 


174  THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

to  which  it  belongs.  Throw  your  cable  across  to  it,  and  you 
find  that  it  holds.  Throw  your  bridge  across  to  it,  and  the 
treasures,  the  society,  of  that  realm  will  begin  to  pour  in.  Nature 
in  all  her  departments  is  full  of  answers,  most  of  which  we  have 
not  yet  learned  to  decipher.  But  our  highest  nature,  as  it  throws 
out  its  signals  to  the  silent  air — that,  too,  is  answered  back. 
The  notes  that  come  to  us,  faint  and  far  off  though  they  may 
seem,  are  from  the  realm  of  the  real.  Nature,  so  honest  with  us 
in  all  our  lower  questionings,  will  not  turn  traitor  to  us  in  this 
last  and  highest.  The  range  of  things  through  which  she  leads 
us  are  the  outer  courts  of  a  temple.     Her  final  secret  is  God.^ 

^  J.  Brierley,  Religion  and  To-Day,  252. 


IX. 

Personal  Demands  of  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H.,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 

Bounds,  E.  M.,  Purpose  in  Prayer  (1914). 

Gordon,  S.  D.,  Quiet  Talks  on  Prayer. 

Greenwell,  Dora,  Essays  (1867). 

How,  W.  W.,  Plain  Words,  iv.  (1901). 

Jowett,  B.,  Sermons  on  Faith  and  Doctrine  (1901). 

Knight,  G.  H.,  Full  Allegiance  (1909). 

Lyttelton,  A.  T.,  College  and  University  Sermons  (1894). 

Monrad,  D.  G.,  The  World  of  Prayer  (1879). 

Mortimer,  A.  G.,  Catholic  Faith  and  Practice  (1897). 

Murray,  A.,  With  Christ  in  the  School  of  Prayer  (1899). 

Ottley,  R.  L.,  Christian  Ideas  and  Ideals  (1909). 

Pusey,  E.  B.,  Occasional  Sermons  (1884). 

Swetenham,  L.,  Conquering  Prayer  (1908). 

Tailing,  M.  P.,  Inter- Communion  with  God  (1905). 

Thomas,  H.  A.,  in  Faith  and  CHticism  (1893). 

Thomas,  W.  H.  G.,  Life  Abiding  and  Abounding. 

Vaughan,  C.  J.,  Voices  of  the  Prophets  (1867). 

Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 

London  Quarterly  Review,  July  1908,  p.  1  (P.  T.  Forsyth). 


176 


Personal  Demands  of  Prayer. 

We  have  already  spoken  of  what  we  have  called  the  First 
Principles  of  Prayer — that  prevailing  prayer  must  be  in  accordance 
with  the  will  of  God,  in  the  name  of  Christ,  and  in  the  power  of 
the  Holy  Spirit.  We  are  now  to  deal  with  some  of  the  less 
essential  but  still  very  important  demands  that  are  made  upon  us, 
if  our  prayer  is  to  prevail.  These  are — Knowledge  of  God ;  Re- 
pentance ;  Faith,  Hope,  and  Love  ;  Importunity. 

I. 

Knowledge. 

1.  Prayer  is  founded  upon  knowledge.  For  prayer  is  speaking 
to  God.  And  before  we  can  speak  to  God,  we  must  know  God. 
How  shall  they  call,  an  Apostle  asks,  on  Him  in  whom  they  have 
not  believed  ?  Even  the  prayer  of  the  heathen,  so  far  as  it  is 
prayer,  rests  upon  knowledge.  If  he  speaks  to  an  idol — if  he 
asks  aid  of  wood  or  stone,  and  stops  there — then  the  nonentity  of 
the  object  communicates  itself  to  the  worship']:  an  idol  is  nothing 
in  the  world,  and  the  prayer  which  treats  it  as  an  existence  is 
itself  nothing.  But  if  the  heathen  man  in  any  degree  looks 
through  the  idol  to  a. Being  conceived  of  as  distinct  from  it ;  if  he 
so  much  as  recognizes  one  of  God's  real  attributes,  say  even  power, 
and  addresses  himself  to  that ;  then,  in  the  same  proportion,  the 
lie  of  his  idolatry  becomes  tinged  and  tinctured  with  a  truth,  and 
the  cry,  "  O  Baal,  hear  us,"  may  be  the  faint  shadow  and  reflection 
of  a  better  worship,  because  it  also,  even  it,  has  this  characteristic 
of  the  prayer  we  speak  of,  that  it  is  founded  (in  some  one  point 
at  least)  upon  knowledge.  The  man  has  an  idea  of  God  as  a 
God  of  power.  The  prayer  which  knew  nothing  whatever  of  its 
object,  or  which  called  upon  Him  in  no  one  respect  as  He  is, 

177  12 


178   THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

would  lack  the  first  principle  of  all  prayer,  that  it  must  have  a 
basis  of  knowledge. 

Are  not  Christian  prayers  often  destitute  of  this  first  condition  ? 
To  how  many  might  the  remonstrance  of  God  now  be  addressed, 
"  Thou  thoughtest  that  I  was  altogether  such  an  one  as  thy- 
self"; such  in  discernment,  such  in  equity,  such  in  veracity, 
or  such  in  power !  How  many,  even  in  prayer,  never  let  God 
into  their  secrets ;  hope  to  elude  His  inspection,  try  to  baffle  His 
intuition !  How  many,  even  in  prayer,  expect  of  God  a  treat- 
ment neither  just  nor  moral ;  ask  of  Him  some  compromise  with 
evil,  and  a  salvation  not  from  but  in  their  sins  !  How  many,  even 
in  prayer,  act  the  hypocrite  and  the  dissembler,  professing  desires 
which  they  do  not  feel,  and  regrets  and  repentances  which  do  not 
deceive  even  themselves  !  How  many  still  expect  to  be  heard  for 
their  much  speaking,  or  to  overbear  the  counsels  of  the  Unchange- 
able by  the  vehemence  of  their  importunity  !  All  such  prayers 
lack  the  requisite — the  knowledge,  the  true  knowledge,  of  Him 
to  whom  they  are  offered. 

IF  Before  we  can  pray  to  God  in  a  worthy  manner,  we  must 
distinguish  between  the  earthly  and  the  heavenly  Father.  For 
although  we  speak  of  Him  as  a  Father,  which  implies  also  the 
idea  of  personality,  we  do  not  mean  that  He  is  subject  to  personal 
caprice,  or  that  He  favours  some  of  His  children  more  than  others, 
or  that  He  will  alter  His  universal  laws  in  order  to  avert  some 
calamity  from  us.  All  experience  is  against  this,  and  we  should 
destroy  religion  if  we  set  up  faith  against  universal  experience. 
For  either  we  should  dwell  in  a  sort  of  fools'  paradise,  beUeving 
that  our  prayers  had  been  answered  when  they  had  not  been, 
because  we  had  asked  things  which  God  could  not  grant  (for 
they  were  at  variance  with  the  laws  of  the  universe) ;  or  we 
should  deny  that  there  was  a  God  altogether,  because  there  was 
no  such  God  as  we  had  imagined.  We  must  enlarge  the  horizon 
of  our  thoughts,  and  conceive  of  God  once  more  as  the  infinite, 
the  eternal  Father,  **with  whom  there  is  no  variableness,  nor 
shadow  of  turning  "  either  in  the  physical  or  in  the  moral  world  ; 
He  of  whom  Christ  says,  "  Are  not  two  sparrows  sold  for  one 
farthing  ?  and  yet  your  heavenly  Father  careth  for  them,"  and 
*'  The  very  hairs  of  your  head  are  all  numbered  "  ;  and  yet  also 
the  universal  law,  the  mind  or  reason  which  contains  all  laws,  as 
much  above  the  world  of  which  He  is  the  Author  as  our  souls  are 
above  our  bodies ;  in  whom  all  things  live  and  move  and  have 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER     179 

their  being ;  who  is  the  perfection  of  all  things,  and  yet  distinct 
from  them.i 

IF  There  are  five  everyday  words  I  want  to  bring  before 
you  to  suggest  something  of  who  God  is.  They  are  familiar 
words,  in  constant  use.  The  first  is  the  word  father.  "  Father  " 
stands  for  strength,  loving  strength.  A  father  plans,  and  pro- 
vides for,  and  protects  his  loved  ones.  All  fathers  are  not  good. 
How  man  can  extract  the  meaning  out  of  a  fine  word,  and  use 
the  word  without  its  meaning  !  If  you  will  think  of  the  finest 
father  ever  you  knew  that  anybody  ever  had  ;  think  of  him  now. 
Then  remember  this,  God  is  a  father,  only  He  is  so  much  finer  a 
father  than  the  finest  father  you  ever  knew  of.  And  His  will  for 
your  life — I  am  not  talking  about  heaven,  and  our  souls  just 
now,  though  that  is  in  it  too — His  will  for  your  life  down 
here  these  days  is  a  father's  will  for  the  one  most  dearly  loved. 

The  second  word  is  a  finer  word.  Because  woman  is  finer  than 
man,  and  was  made,  and  meant  to  be,  this  second  word  is  finer 
than  the  first.  I  mean  the  word  mother.  If  ''  father  "  stands  for 
strength,  "mother"  stands  for  love — great,  patient,  tender,  fine- 
fibred,  enduring  love.  What  would  she  not  do  for  her  loved 
one  !  Why,  not  unlikely  she  went  down  into  the  valley  of  the 
shadow  that  that  life  might  come ;  and  did  it  gladly  with  the 
love-light  shining  out  of  her  eyes.  Yes,  and  would  do  it  again, 
that  the  life  may  remain  if  need  be.  That  is  a  mother.  You 
think  of  the  finest  mother  ever  you  knew.  And  the  suggestion 
brings  the  most  hallowed  memories  to  my  own  heart.  Then  re- 
member this  :  God  is  a  mother,  only  He  is  so  much  finer  a  mother 
than  the  finest  mother  you  ever  knew.  The  references  in  Scrip- 
ture to  God  as  a  mother  are  numerous.  "  Under  his  wings  "  is  a 
mother  figure.  The  mother-bird  gathers  her  brood  up  under  her 
wings  to  feel  the  heat  of  her  body,  and  for  protection.  The  word 
' '  mother  "  is  not  used  for  God  in  the  Bible.  I  think  it  is  because 
with  God  "  father  "  includes  "  mother  ".  It  takes  more  of  the 
human  to  tell  the  story  than  of  the  Divine.  With  God,  all  the 
strength  of  the  father  and  all  the  fine  love  of  the  mother  are 
combined  in  that  word  "  father  ".  And  His  will  for  us  is  a 
mother's  will,  a  wise  loving  mother's  will  for  the  darling  of  her 
heart. 

The  third  word  is  friend.  I  do  not  mean  to  use  it  in  the 
cheaper  meaning.  There  is  a  certain  kindliness  of  speech  in 
which  all  acquaintances  are  called  friends.  Tupper  says  we  call 
all  men  friends  who  are  not  known  to  be  enemies.  But  I  mean 
to  use  the  word  in  its  finer  meaning.     Here,  a  friend  is  one  who 

^B.  Jowett,  Sermons  on  Faith  and  Doctrine^  262. 


i8o  THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

loves  you  for  your  sake  only,  and  steadfastly  loves  without  regard 
to  any  return,  even  a  return-love.  The  English  have  a  saying 
that  you  may  fill  a  church  with  your  acquaintances,  and  not  fill 
the  pulpit  seats  with  your  friends.  If  you  may  have  in  your  life 
one  or  two  real  friends  you  are  very  wealthy.  If  you  will  think 
for  a  moment  of  the  very  best  friend  you  ever  knew  anybody  ot 
have.  Then  remember  this  :  God  is  a  friend.  Only  He  is  ever 
so  much  better  a  friend  than  the  best  friend  you  ever  knew  of. 
And  the  plan  He  has  thought  out  for  your  life  is  such  a  one  as 
that  word  would  suggest. 

The  fourth  word,  I  almost  hesitate  to  use.  The  hesitancy  is 
because  the  word  and  its  relationship  are  spoken  of  lightly, 
frivolously,  so  much,  even  in  good  circles.  I  mean  that  rare  fine 
word  lover.  Where  two  have  met,  and  acquaintance  has  deepened 
into  friendship,  and  that  in  turn  into  the  holiest  emotion,  the 
highest  friendship.  What  would  he  not  do  for  her  !  She  be- 
comes the  new  human  centre  of  his  life.  In  a  good  sense  he 
worships  the  ground  she  treads  upon.  And  she — she  will  leave 
wealth  for  poverty  if  only  so  she  may  be  with  him  in  the  coming 
days.  She  will  leave  home  and  friends,  and  go  to  the  ends  of 
the  earth  if  his  service  calls  him  there.  You  think  of  the  finest 
lover,  man  or  woman,  you  ever  knew  anybody  to  have.  Then 
remember  this,  and  let  me  say  it  in  soft,  reverent  tones,  God  is  a 
lover — shall  I  say  in  yet  more  reverent  voice,  a  sweetheart-lover. 
Only  He  is  so  much  finer  a  lover  than  the  finest  lover  you  ever 
knew  of.  And  His  will.  His  plan  for  your  life  and  mine — it 
hushes  my  heart  to  say  it — is  a  lover's  plan  for  his  only  loved 
one. 

The  fifth  word  is  this  fourth  word  a  degree  finer  spun,  a  stage 
farther  on,  and  higher  up,  the  word  husband.  This  is  the  word 
on  the  man  side  for  the  most  hallowed  relationship  of  earth. 
This  is  the  lover  relationship  in  its  perfection  stage.  With  men 
"  husband  "  is  not  always  a  finer  word  than  "  lover  ".  The  more's 
pity.  How  man  does  cheapen  God's  plan  of  things ;  leaves  out 
the  kernel,  and  keeps  only  an  empty  shell  sometimes.  In  God's 
thought  a  husband  is  a  lover  flus.  He  is  all  that  the  finest 
lover  is,  and  more ;  more  tender,  more  eager,  more  thoughtful. 
Two  lives  are  joined,  and  begin  living  one  life.  Two  wills,  yet 
one.  Two  persons,  yet  one  purpose.  Duality  in  unity.  Will 
you  call  to  mind  for  a  moment  the  best  husband  you  ever  knew 
any  woman  to  have  ?  Then  remember  this,  that  God  is  a  husband ; 
only  He  is  an  infinitely  more  thoughtful  husband  than  any  you 
ever  knew.  And  His  will  for  your  life  is  a  husband's  will  for 
his  Life's  friend  and  companion. 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER     i8i 

Now,  please,  do  not  you  take  one  of  these  words,  and  say,  "  I 
like  that  " ;  and  you  another  and  say,  *'  That  conce  ption  of  God 
appeals  to  me,"  and  you  another.  How  we  do  whittle  God  down 
to  our  narrow  conceptions  !  You  must  take  all  five  words,  and 
think  the  finest  meaning  into  each,  and  then  put  them  all  to- 
gether, to  get  a  close  up  idea  of  God.     He  is  all  that,  and  more} 

2.  One  great  defect  in  the  common  practice  of  prayer  is  that 
we  do  not  sufficiently  realize  the  personal  character  of  the  God 
whom  we  are  addressing.  Our  prayer  too  often  seems  as  if  we 
had  forgotten  that  we  are  persons  praying  to  another  Person. 
In  some  this  arises  from  the  common  mode  of  talk  in  our  day, 
which  prefers  to  look  on  God  as  the  one  force  pervading  the  uni- 
verse, the  great  source  of  law,  the  essence  and  substance  of  all 
that  is,  rather  than  as  a  Person  to  whom  love,  and  honour,  and 
reverence  are  due.  To  such  minds  prayer  is  an  act  by  which  we 
put  ourselves  in  harmony  with  universal  law,  or  are  filled  with  a 
sense  of  the  greatness  of  the  universe ;  it  is  not  a  petition  ad- 
dressed to  Him  ''who  heareth  the  prayer"  and  to  whom  "all 
flesh  ^hall  come  ".  This  tendency,  which  in  its  extreme  form  is 
mere  paganism  or  pantheism,  subtly  afiects  those  who  would  be 
horrified  to  hear  that  they  were  not  devout  Christians ;  it  makes 
their  prayers  less  confiding,  less  loving,  less  reverent. 

(1)  The  first  essential,  then,  when  we  come  to  pray,  is  loving 
confidence,  trust  in  Him  to  whom  we  pray,  certainty  that  it  is 
right  for  us  to  ask,  and  that  in  some  way,  unguessed  perhaps  by 
us.  He  will  bring  it  to  pass.  If  we  would  rightly  conceive  of 
God  and  of  our  relations  to  Him,  we  must  take  away  from  the 
human  relation  of  parent  and  child  all  that  is  imperfect,  temporary, 
limited;  we  must  think  of  a  child  devoid  of  fear,  perfectly 
straightforward,  with  complete  confidence  in  his  father's  love 
and  power ;  we  must  think  of  a  Father  in  whom  is  no  possible 
variation  in  His  wish  to  hear  His  children,  who  knows  no  weari- 
ness, no  moments  of  indifference,  whom  no  engrossing  cares  can 
hinder  from  listening  with  all-embracing  love  to  the  imperfect 
utterance  of  those  whom  He  has  made.  Such  is  the  God  to  whom 
we  pray ;  such  is  the  attitude  which  he  means  us  to  adopt  towards 
Him. 

'  S.  D.  Gordon,  Quiet  Talks  on  Prayer,  177. 


i82    THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  Everything  turns  to  me  on  the  one  foundation-fact  that 
God  is  love — not  only  love  toward  all,  but  love  toward  me  per- 
sonally, F.  W.  C. !  Then  with  that  in  mind  I  see  that  this  Lover 
of  my  soul  directs  me  to  pray  for  all  things,  and  it  is  abundantly 
clear  that  answered  prayer  encourages  faith  and  personal  relations 
in  a  way  which  broad  principles  only  cannot  effect.  As  the 
Spectator  put  it  many  years  ago,  much  that  would  be  positively 
bad  for  us  if  given  without  prayer  is  good  if  sent  in  answer. 
We  feel  (do  we  not  ?)  that  all  the  evil  of  the  world  springs  from 
mistrust  of  God.  Nothing  can  recover  us  from  this  state  of 
alienated  unrest  like  answered  prayer.  Simon  the  Sorcerer 
wanted  Holy-Ghost  power,  without  asking  God  for  it,  to  traffic 
on  his  own  separate  account.  It  would  have  been  evil  had  he 
got  it  thus  for  money  and  not  in  answer  to  prayer.  But  no  gift 
rivals  the  indwelling  of  the  Giver  Himself,  and  this  can,  as  a  rule, 
only  be  had  in  answer  to  prayer  of  a  most  earnest  sort.^ 

(2)  But  this  very  attitude  of  mind,  this  perfect  trust  and  cer- 
tainty, involves  another  element  of  the  child-like  relation  to  the 
Father,  the  element  of  profound  reverence.  It  is  in  most  cases 
the  great  fault  in  our  habits  of  prayer  that  they  are  not  reverent. 
We  do  not  realize  our  relation  to  God,  we  do  not  approach  Him 
with  "  reverence  and  godly  fear,"  we  treat  Him  in  our  prayers, 
both  private  and  public,  as  we  should  not  venture  to  treat  an 
earthly  superior,  an  earthly  father ;  we  make  our  petitions  with 
a  carelessness  which,  in  earthly  things,  would  prove  that  they 
mattered  very  little  to  us. 

IF  Neglect  nothing  which  can  produce  reverence.  Pass  not  at 
once  from  the  things  of  this  world  to  prayer,  but  collect  thyself. 
Think  what  thou  art,  what  God  is  ;  thyself  a  child,  and  God  thy 
Father ;  but  also  thyself  dust  and  ashes,  God  a  consuming  fire, 
before  whom  angels  hide  their  faces  ;  thyself  unholy,  God  holy ; 
thyself  a  sinner,  God  thy  Judge.  And  to  this  it  will  help,  before 
you  first  pray,  reverently  to  repeat  your  Belief,  as  confessing  be- 
fore God  all  He  has  wrought  for  you,  and  His  own  Majesty  ;  or 
as  they  did  of  old,  to  think  of  the  last  four  things,  Death,  Judg- 
ment, Heaven,  Hell ;  what  thou  hopest,  everlasting  life ;  what 
thou  fearest,  unceasing  misery ;  what  thou  needest,  God's  pardon- 
ing, preventing,  assisting,  perfecting  grace,  to  save  thee  from  the 
one,  and  along  a  strait  and  narrow  path  to  guide  thee  to  the 
other ;  nay  further  yet,  God's  help,  that  thou  mayest  fear  the  one 

1 F.  W.  Crossley,  in  Life  by  J.  Rendel  Harris,  171. 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER     183 

and  hope  for  the  other ;  for  the  very  power  to  dread  hell,  or  to 
hope  for  Heaven,  is  itself  a  great  gift  of  God.^ 

II. 

Repentance. 

Another  condition  of  success  in  prayer  is  repentance.  The  word 
is  used  in  its  full  meaning  of  both  sorrow  for  sin  and  turning 
from  it.  Every  one  who  refuses  to  renounce  his  wrath,  arro- 
gance, and  greed,  his  intemperance,  his  sensuality,  certainly  does 
well  not  to  pray ;  for  prayer  is  then  a  lie,  and  only  serves  to 
harden  the  heart  still  more.  How  can  he  truthfully  say,  "  Hal- 
lowed be  thy  name,"  while  he  will  not  let  God's  name  be  hallowed 
in  his  heart  and  life  ?  How  can  he  pray  aright  for  the  forgive- 
ness of  sins,  with  his  secret  purpose  to  retain  his  sins,  with  an 
implacable  mind,  with  hatred  and  strife  ?  How  can  he  pray  not 
to  be  tempted,  when  he  gladly  goes  after  temptation  directly  it 
comes  ?  How  can  he  pray  to  be  saved  from  the  power  of  the 
evil  one,  while  surrendering  himself  to  the  power  of  the  Evil  One, 
and  letting  it  rule  over  him  ?  The  door  of  prayer  opens  only  to 
the  earnest  will  that  yields  to  the  leading  of  the  Holy  Spirit  in 
inclination  and  life.  It  may  happen  that  a  man  who  has  been 
accustomed  to  pray  perseveres  in  the  custom  after  secretly  pur- 
posing to  indulge  some  evil  passion  that  has  dominion  over  him. 
But  such  prayer  is  an  abomination  to  the  Lord.  No  sin  is  so 
great  that  it  should  hinder  prayer,  if  a  man  but  sincerely  re- 
nounces his  sin ;  but  no  sin  is  so  small  as  not  to  turn  prayer 
itself  into  sin,  if  there  is  not  the  disposition  to  resist  and  over- 
come it.  It  is  the  bent  of  our  will,  our  disposition,  that  renders 
prayer  either  pleasing  or  displeasing  to  God.  Though  a  man  sm 
seven  times,  nay,  seventy  times  seven,  but  as  often  without  secret 
hypocrisy  turns  to  God  and  implores  power  and  strength  at  last 
to  gain  the  victory,  from  such  prayer  God  will  of  a  truth  not 
turn  away  His  ear.  The  hour  will  come  when  the  penitent 
suppliant  shall  be  able  to  thank  God  for  victory. 

1.  Without  obedience  there  can  never  be  communion.  How 
should  there  be  ?     In  the  first  place  there  can  be  no  vision,  no 

'  E.  B.  PuBey,  Occasional  Sermons,  134. 


i84   THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

deep  sense  of  God,  without  that  fidelity  to  conscience  in  which 
obedience  to  Heaven  consists.  The  pure  in  heart  see  God.  And 
the  pure  in  heart  are  those  who  seek,  in  all  sincerity  and  single- 
ness of  mind,  to  do  their  duty  hour  by  hour.  They  are  the 
people  to  whom  God  becomes  a  Reality,  a  Being  who  lives  and 
reigns,  and  who  can  be  spoken  to.  We  need  not  stay  to  inquire 
why  this  should  be  so.  The  theme  is  a  tempting  one,  but  it  is 
enough  to  say  here  that  human  experience  has  abundantly  proved 
that  it  is  so.  Men  have  found  out  that  things  which  are  hidden 
from  the  keen  eyes  and  persistent  search  of  the  philosophic  mind 
are  revealed  to  the  consecrated  spirit. 

IT  "  Teach  me  to  do  thy  will  "  (Ps.  cxliii.  10).  That  is  a  very 
simple  prayer,  but  it  is  one  of  the  deepest  and  most  comprehen- 
sive of  prayers,  for  it  embraces  the  whole  round  of  obedience 
from  first  to  last,  in  small  things  and  great  alike,  in  the  inner  as 
well  as  in  the  outer  life — that  universal  obedience  which  Paul 
calls  "  standing  perfect  in  all  the  will  of  God  ". 

Matthew  Henry  sums  up  the  whole  matter  of  obedience  in  a 
few  words,  when  he  says,  "  To  obey  God's  commandments  is  to 
obey  them  universally,  without  dividing  them  ;  sincerely,  without 
evading  them ;  cheerfully,  without  disputing  them  ;  and  con- 
tinually, without  declining  from  them  ".  And  John  Newton  hit 
the  truth  exactly  when  he  said,  "  If  two  angels  were  to  receive 
at  the  same  moment  a  commission  from  God,  one  to  go  down  and 
rule  earth's  grandest  empire,  the  other  to  go  and  sweep  the  streets 
of  one  of  its  meanest  villages,  it  would  be  a  matter  of  entire 
indifference  to  each  which  service  fell  to  his  lot,  the  post  of  ruler 
or  the  post  of  scavenger ;  for  the  joy  of  the  angels  lies  only  in 
obedience  to  God's  will,  and  with  equal  joy  they  would  lift  a 
Lazarus  in  his  rags  to  Abraham's  bosom,  or  be  a  chariot  of  fire  to 
carry  an  Elijah  home  "} 

2.  And,  further,  even  if  it  were  possible  to  have  any  vivid 
sense  of  God  without  the  subjection  of  the  human  will  to  His, 
there  could  be  no  joy  in  prayer  without  it.  Two  cannot  walk 
together  unless  they  be  agreed.  Man  may  meet  with  God  in 
solitary  moments,  but  he  cannot  walk  with  Him  in  peace  and 
liberty  if  he  is  conscious  of  any  want  of  harmony  between  himself 
and  his  Companion.  He  cannot  speak  freely,  he  cannot  ask  for 
help,  or  for  forgiveness,  he  cannot  even  confess  his  sin,  if  there  is 

J  G.  H.  Knight,  Full  Allegiance,  123. 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER     185 

any  sin  unrepented  of — in  other  words,  if  he  is  insisting,  and 
knows  it,  on  choosing  his  own  way,  in  any  particular,  and  not 
God's  way.  Inevitably  there  will  be  a  sense  of  constraint,  and  a 
painful  shrinking,  and  a  desire  to  escape,  so  long  as  there  is  this 
secret  rebellion  of  the  heart,  this  resolve  to  hold  back  something 
which  God  claims,  and  is  felt  to  have  a  right  to  claim.  From 
this  cause  the  prayers  of  men  are  often  fatally  hindered. 

IF  That  wilful  sin  while  unrepented  of  must  act  as  a  barrier 
to  prayer  is  implied  in  the  wider  sense  of  the  word  "  devotion  " 
itself.  "  Devotion"  means  a  life  given  or  devoted  to  God.  '  The 
devout"  are  those  who  offer  themselves  to  God  to  serve  Him,  a 
definition  which,  if  realized  in  life,  would  make  an  antithesis  ex- 
pressed too  frequently  between  "the  devout"  and  "the  good" 
impossible.^ 

If  A  striking  proverb  current  among  the  Hausa  tribes  of 
Northern  Nigeria  expresses  an  instinct  which  a  religion  not 
only  so  imperfect  but,  in  subjects  of  grave  importance,  so  false 
as  the  Mohammedan,  cannot  obliterate,  because  it  is  in  the  highest 
sense  natural  to  man,  as  created  in  the  image,  after  the  likeness, 
of  God  Himself.  "  If  there  is  no  purity,"  they  say,  '*  there  is  no 
prayer ;  if  there  is  no  prayer,  there  is  no  drinking  of  the  water 
of  heaven.  "2 

When  thine  essence  is  purified  from  sin, 

Thy  prayer  then  becomes  a  refreshment  and  delight ; 

No  barrier  remains  between ; 

For  the  Kjiower  and  the  Known  have  become  one.^ 

III. 
Faith,  Hope,  and  Love. 

"Faith,  hope,  and  love."  These  are  the  three  theological 
virtues.  Through  these  virtues  a  deep  relation  between  the  soul 
and  God  is  maintained.  The  true  Christian  love  of  God  rests 
upon  the  basis  of  faith  in  His  atoning  love,  and  of  hope  in  His 
promises.  In  true  prayer  all  three  virtues  are  necessarily 
exercised.  For  faith  is  the  foundation  of  prayer — "  Whatsoever 
ye  shall  ask  in  prayer,  believing,  ye  shall  receive  ".  Hope  is  the 
ladder  by  which  faith  ascends  to  love.     And  love  is  the  cord 

>  A.  J.  Worlledge,  Prayer,  186.  ^Ihid.,  184. 

'  Shabistari,  in  Field's  Little  Book  of  Eastern  Wisdom,  54. 


i86   THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

which  not  only  binds  man  to  God,  but  draws  him  even  now  to 
Heaven.  "  I,  if  I  be  lifted  up  from  the  earth,  will  draw  all  men 
unto  me." 

Prayer  holds  its  fundamental  place  in  the  life  of  religion 
because  it  is  in  reality  an  attitude  of  the  spirit  rather  than  a 
formal  exercise.  It  is  the  voice  of  trustful  faith,  which  always 
and  everywhere  stays  itself  on  God ;  it  is  the  utterance  of  hope, 
seeking  not  the  gifts  of  God,  but  His  very  Self ;  it  is  the  expres- 
sion of  love  which  aims  at  complete  union  of  heart  and  will  with 
God.  Thus  prayer  is  one  of  the  great  forces  tending  to  bring 
about  the  extension  of  the  Divine  Kingdom — that  is,  the  sphere 
in  which  God's  will  is  embraced  and  fulfilled.  It  is  the  supreme 
aid  to  holiness  because  it  implies  the  God  ward  direction  of  the 
entire  life,  the  dedication  of  the  will  to  the  fulfilment  of  the 
Divine  purpose ;  and 

He  always  wins  who  sides  with  God. 

IF  One  of  Melanchthon's  correspondents  writes  of  Luther's 
praying :  "  I  cannot  enough  admire  the  extraordinary  cheerful- 
ness, constancy,  faith,  and  hope  of  the  man  in  these  trying  and 
vexatious  times.  He  constantly  feeds  these  gracious  aflfections 
by  a  very  diligent  study  of  the  Word  of  God.  Then  not  a  day 
passes  in  which  he  does  not  employ  in  prayer  at  least  three  of 
his  very  best  hours.  Once  I  happened  to  hear  him  at  prayer. 
Gracious  God  !  What  spirit  and  what  faith  is  there  in  his  ex- 
pressions !  He  petitions  God  with  as  much  reverence  as  if  he 
were  in  the  Divine  presence,  and  yet  with  as  firm  a  hope  and 
confidence  as  he  would  address  a  father  or  a  friend.  '  I  know,' 
said  he,  '  Thou  art  our  Father  and  our  God  ;  and  therefore  I  am 
sure  Thou  wilt  bring  to  naught  the  persecutors  of  Thy  children. 
For  shouldest  Thou  fail  to  do  this,  Thine  own  cause,  being  con- 
nected with  ours,  would  be  endangered.  It  is  entirely  Thine  own 
concern.  We,  by  Thy  providence,  have  been  compelled  to  take 
a  part.  Thou  therefore  wilt  be  our  defence.'  Whilst  I  was 
listening  to  Luther  praying  in  this  manner,  at  a  distance,  my 
soul  seemed  on  fire  within  me,  to  hear  the  man  address  God  so 
like  a  friend,  yet  with  so  much  gravity  and  reverence ;  and  also 
to  hear  him,  in  the  course  of  his  prayer,  insisting  on  the  promises 
contained  in  the  Psalms,  as  if  he  were  sure  his  petitions  would 
be  granted."^ 

1  E.  M.  Bounds,  Purpose  in  Prayer,  37. 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER     187 

1.  Faith, — Faith  is  the  inevitable  and  essential  accompani- 
ment of  all  true  prayer.  Prayer  must  be  based  on  Divine 
revelation  and  find  its  warrant  in  the  promises  and  assurances  of 
God's  love  and  grace.  This  distinguishes  Christian  prayer  from 
everything  that  goes  by  the  name  of  prayer  in  heathen  religions. 
Christian  prayer  is  based  on  the  Word  of  God.  God  encourages, 
commands,  invites,  welcomes  prayer.  The  charter  of  prayer  was 
given  by  our  Lord  at  the  outset  of  His  ministry.  "  Ask,  and  it 
shall  be  given  you  ;  seek,  and  ye  shall  find  ;  knock,  and  it  shall 
be  opened  unto  you."  This  charter  was  confirmed  again  and 
again  through  His  earthly  ministry  until  it  found  its  crown  in 
His  fullest,  deepest  teaching  on  prayer  on  the  eve  of  the  cruci- 
fixion, when  He  taught  His  disciples  the  meaning  of  prayer  :  "in 
my  name  ".  This  warrant  of  prayer  is  accordingly  met  by  our 
response  of  trust.  Our  faith  accepts  the  assurance  that  prayer 
will  be  heard  and  answered,  and  pleads  the  fulfilment  of  Divine 
promises.  Faith  is  thus  the  only  possible  response  to  the  Divine 
revelation,  and  apart  from  our  belief  in  God  as  the  Hearer  of 
prayer  there  could  not  be  any  real  prayer  or  genuine  blessing. 
"  He  that  cometh  to  God  must  believe  that  he  is,  and  that  he  is  a 
rewarder  of  them  that  diligently  seek  him  ".  -Herein  lies  the 
intimate  and  necessary  connexion  between  the  Word  of  God 
and  prayer.  The  greater  our  knowledge  of  Scripture  and 
the  richer  our  experience  of  its  preciousness,  the  fuller  and 
deeper  will  be  our  prayers,  until  it  shall  become  the  simplest 
and  most  natural  and  most  instructive  experience  of  our  life 
to  live  in  the  Divine  Presence  and  rest  on  the  Divine  promises, 
and  then  to  pour  out  our  souls  in  the  prayer  of  faith  and 
believe  to  see  the  goodness  of  the  Lord  in  the  land  of  the 
living. 

IT  In  any  natural  action,  say  that  of  sowing  a  seed,  the  mental 
attitude  of  the  sower  signifies  nothing ;  the  seed  will  come  up 
whether  he  expects  it  to  do  so  or  not ;  but  in  any  act  between 
two  conscious  intelligent  beings,  the  mental  attitude  being  ob- 
viously everything,  the  measure  of  faith  is  the  measure  of  prayer. 
Faith  makes  the  soul  God's  creditor  (believer),  in  a  literal  sense 
it  gives  the  soul  a  claim  and  hold  upon  Him.^ 

(1)  The  importance  of  the  place  which  faith  holds  in  spiritual 

1  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays,  131. 


i88   THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

intercourse  will  be  perceived  the  moment  we  recognize  that  faith 
is  our  act  of  appropriating  spiritual  truth  and  grace.  God's 
bestowments  are  offered  freely.  We  become  powerful  in  pro- 
portion as  we  make  them  our  own.  Men  of  faith  are  men  of 
capacity  for  receiving  and  using  forces  which  are  Divinely  pro- 
vided for  all.  The  majority  allow  these  to  pass  unappropriated. 
The  elect  minority,  availing  themselves  of  Divine  potency,  act  for 
God,  or  rather  allow  Him  to  act  through  them,  in  extraordinary 
ways. 

(2)  This  brings  us  to  the  point  where  we  see  faith  as  a  force. 
Because  it  makes  a  man  receptive  of  God  it  makes  him  conqueror 
over  everything  alien  to  God.  The  human  becomes  the  medium 
of  the  Divine.  When  eternal  power  operates  through  a  man  he 
is  no  longer  a  loose  particle  on  the  surface  of  things,  but  becomes 
a  part  of  the  universe,  so  built  into  it  that  he  stands  with  God 
and  for  God  with  a  power  not  his  own.  He  becomes  as  stable 
as  the  throne  which  God  has  erected  within  him.  He  is  led  to 
the  stake.  Fire  cannot  melt  the  forces  which  make  him  im- 
movable. Does  he  encounter  princes  and  potentates?  Un- 
blanched  he  stands  before  kings,  or  meets  the  rage  of  tyrants, 
invincible  through  a  power  which  has  no  other  explanation. 
Human  frailty  becomes  an  exhibition  of  Divine  stability.  "  I 
live ;  yet  not  I,  but  Christ  liveth  in  me  :  and  the  life  which 
I  now  live  in  the  flesh  I  live  by  the  faith  of  the  Son  of  God." 

IT  After  concluding  my  last  service  about  ten  o'clock  that 
night,  a  poor  man  asked  me  to  go  and  pray  with  his  wife,  saying 
that  she  was  dying.  I  readily  agreed,  and  on  the  way  to  his 
house  asked  him  why  he  had  not  sent  for  the  priest,  as  his  accent 
told  me  he  was  an  Irishman.  He  had  done  so,  he  said,  but  the 
priest  refused  to  come  without  a  payment  of  eighteen  pence,  which 
the  man  did  not  possess,  as  the  family  was  starving.  Immedi- 
ately it  occurred  to  my  mind  that  all  the  money  I  had  in  the 
world  was  a  solitary  half-crown,  and  that  it  was  in  one  coin ; 
moreover,  that  while  the  basin  of  water-gruel  I  usually  took  for 
supper  was  awaiting  me,  and  there  was  sufficient  in  the  house  for 
breakfast  in  the  morning,  I  certainly  had  nothing  for  dinner  on 
the  coming  day. 

Somehow  or  other  there  was  at  once  a  stoppage  in  the  flow  of 
joy  in  my  heart.  But  instead  of  reproving  myself  I  began  to 
reprove  the  poor  man,  telling  him  that  it  was  very  wrong  to  have 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER     189 

allowed  matters  to  get  into  such  a  state  as  he  described,  and  that 
he  ought  to  have  applied  to  the  relieving  officer.  His  answer 
was  that  he  had  done  so,  and  was  told  to  come  at  eleven  o'clock 
the  next  morning,  but  that  he  feared  his  wife  might  not  live 
through  the  night. 

'*  Ah,"  thought  I,  "if  only  I  had  two  shillings  and  a  sixpence 
instead  of  this  half-crown,  how  gladly  would  I  give  these  poor 
people  a  shilling  !  "  But  to  part  with  the  half-crown  was  far 
from  my  thoughts.  I  little  dreamed  that  the  truth  of  the  matter 
simply  was  that  I  could  trust  God  plus  one  and  sixpence,  but 
was  not  prepared  to  trust  Him  only,  without  any  money  at  all 
in  my  pocket. 

My  conductor  led  me  into  a  court,  down  which  I  followed 
him  with  some  degree  of  nervousness.  I  had  found  myself  there 
before,  and  at  my  last  visit  had  been  roughly  handled.  My  tracts 
had  been  torn  to  pieces  and  such  a  warning  given  me  not  to 
come  again  that  I  felt  more  than  a  little  concerned.  Still,  it  was 
the  path  of  duty,  and  I  followed  on.  Up  a  miserable  flight  of 
stairs  into  a  wretched  room  he  led  me ;  and  oh,  what  a  sight 
there  presented  itself  !  Four  or  five  children  stood  about,  their 
sunken  cheeks  and  temples  all  telling  unmistakably  the  story  of 
slow  starvation,  and  lying  on  a  wretched  pallet  was  a  poor, 
exhausted  mother,  with  a  tiny  infant  thirty-six  hours  old  moan- 
ing rather  than  crying  at  her  side,  for  it  too  seemed  spent  and 
failing. 

"  Ah  !  "  thought  I,  "if  I  had  two  shillings  and  a  sixpence, 
instead  of  half  a  crown,  how  gladly  should  they  have  one  and 
sixpence  of  it."  But  still  a  wretched  unbelief  prevented  me  from 
obeying  the  impulse  to  relieve  their  distress  at  the  cost  of  all  I 
possessed. 

It  will  scarcely  seem  strange  that  I  was  unable  to  say  much 
to  comfort  these  poor  people.  I  needed  comfort  myself.  I  began 
to  tell  them,  however,  that  they  must  not  be  cast  down ;  that 
though  their  circumstances  were  very  distressing  there  was  a 
kind  and  loving  Father  in  heaven.  But  something  within  me 
cried,  "  You  hypocrite  !  telling  these  unconverted  people  about  a 
kind  and  loving  Father  in  heaven,  and  not  prepared  yourself  to 
trust  Him  without  half  a  crown." 

I  was  nearly  choked.  How  gladly  would  I  have  compromised 
with  conscience,  if  I  had  had  a  florin  and  a  sixpence  !  I  would 
have  given  the  florin  thankfully  and  kept  the  rest.  But  I  was 
not  yet  prepared  to  trust  in  God  alone,  without  the  sixpence. 

To  talk  was  impossible  under  these  circumstances,  yet  strange 
to  say  I  thought  I  should  have  no  difficulty  in  praying.     Prayer 


I90  THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

was  a  delightful  occupation  in  those  days.  Time  thus  spent 
never  seemed  wearisome  and  I  knew  no  lack  of  words.  I  seemed 
to  think  that  all  I  should  have  to  do  would  be  to  kneel  down 
and  pray,  and  that  relief  would  come  to  them  and  to  myself 
together. 

''  You  asked  me  to  come  and  pray  with  your  wife,"  I  said  to 
the  man,  "  let  us  pray."     And  I  knelt  down. 

But  no  sooner  had  I  opened  my  lips  with  "  Our  Father  who 
art  in  heaven"  than  conscience  said  within,  "Dare  you  mock 
God  ?  Dare  you  kneel  down  and  call  Him  Father  with  that  half- 
crown  in  your  pocket  ?  " 

Such  a  time  of  conflict  then  came  upon  me  as  I  have  never 
experienced  before  or  since.  How  I  got  through  that  form  of 
prayer  I  know  not,  and  whether  the  words  uttered  were  connected 
or  disconnected  I  cannot  tell.  But  I  arose  from  my  knees  in 
great  distress  of  mind. 

The  poor  father  turned  to  me  and  said,  "  You  see  what  a  ter- 
rible state  we  are  in,  sir.     If  you  can  help  us,  for  God's  sake  do  ! " 

At  that  moment  the  word  flashed  into  my  mind,  "  Give  to 
him  that  asketh  of  thee  ".  And  in  the  word  of  a  King  there  is 
power. 

I  put  my  hand  into  my  pocket  and  slowly  drawing  out  the  half- 
crown,  gave  it  to  the  man,  telling  him  that  it  might  seem  a  small 
matter  for  me  to  relieve  them,  seeing  that  I  was  comparatively 
well  ofl",  but  that  in  parting  with  that  coin  I  was  giving  him  my 
all ;  what  I  had  been  trying  to  tell  them  was  indeed  true — God 
really  was  a  Father  and  might  be  trusted.  The  joy  all  came 
back  in  full  floodtide  to  my  heart.  I  could  say  anything  and 
feel  it  then,  and  the  hindrance  to  blessing  was  gone — gone,  I 
trust,  for  ever. 

Not  only  was  the  poor  woman's  life  saved ;  but  my  life,  as  I 
fully  realized,  had  been  saved  too.  It  might  have  been  a  wreck — 
would  have  been,  probably,  as  a  Christian  life — had  not  grace  at 
that  time  conquered,  and  the  striving  of  God's  Spirit  been  obeyed. 

I  well  remember  how  that  night,  as  I  went  home  to  my 
lodgings,  my  heart  was  as  light  as  my  pocket.  The  dark,  de- 
serted streets  resounded  with  a  hymn  of  praise  that  I  could  not 
restrain.  When  I  took  my  basin  of  gruel  before  retiring,  I  would 
not  have  exchanged  it  for  a  prince's  feast.  I  reminded  the  Lord 
as  I  knelt  at  my  bedside  of  His  own  Word,  "  He  that  giveth  to 
the  poor  lendeth  to  the  Lord  "  ;  I  asked  Him  not  to  let  my  loan 
be  a  long  one,  or  I  should  have  no  dinner  next  day.  And  with 
peace  within  and  peace  without,  I  spent  a  happy,  restful  night.^ 

1  Hudson  Taylor  in  Early  Years,  133. 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER     191 

2.  Hope. — To  draw  in  devotion  the  exact  line  where  faith 
merges  into  trust,  and  trust  into  hope,  is  not  so  essential  as  it 
would  be  in  the  province  of  Christian  ethics.  Both  faith  and 
hope  blend  in  one  object,  but  "  they  can  be  distinguished  when 
viewed  in  reference  to  the  nature  of  man  :  for  by  the  one  we 
have  a  clear  mental  realization  of  the  promise ;  by  the  other  we 
apply  that  truth  to  our  needs,  make  it  our  own,  and  stimulate 
the  will  to  respond  to  it".  There  is  no  element  of  tenderness  in 
the  Lord's  ministry  on  earth  more  touching  than  the  eifort  made 
by  Him  to  uphold  the  hope  of  those  who  sought  His  aid.  To 
the  palsied  man,  conscious  of  the  sin  which  lay  behind  the  help- 
less suffering,  there  came  on  the  instant  the  gracious  words,  "  Son, 
be  of  good  cheer;  thy  sins  are  forgiven".  "If  thou  canst  do 
anything,  have  compassion  on  us,  and  help  us  " — such  was  the 
almost  despairing  cry  of  the  father  of  the  demoniac  boy.  It  was 
not  only  to  sustain  his  faith,  but  to  infuse  hope  into  the  prayer 
so  timidly  made,  that  "  Jesus  said  unto  him,  If  thou  canst  !  All 
things  are  possible  to  him  that  believeth  " — "  the  decision  rests 
with  you  rather  than  with  Me  whether  this  thing  can  be  done ; 
it  can  be  done  if  thou  belie  vest " — and  hope  nerved  the  final 
appeal,  *'I  believe;  help  thou  mine  unbelief".  So  the  typical 
faith  of  Abraham  had  been  sustained  by  hope.  "  Who,"  says  St. 
Paul,  * '  in  hope  believed  against  hope,  to  the  end  that  he  might 
become  a  father  of  many  nations,  according  to  that  which  had 
been  spoken,  So  shall  thy  seed  be."  So  a  psalmist  met  his  own 
questioning  despondency  by  rousing  himself,  through  an  act  of 
will,  to  hope  : — 

"Why  art  thou  cast  down,  O  my  soul  ? 
And  why  art  thou  disquieted  within  me  ? 
Hope  thou  in  God :  for  I  shall  yet  praise  him, 
For  the  health  of  his  countenance." 

He  turns  from  feelings  ;  they  are  variable.  He  turns  from  a  re- 
view of  action,  because  he  cannot  judge  of  it  aright,  and,  at  the 
best,  it  can  afford  small  comfort  save  to  the  self-complacent.  He 
goes  to  God.  What  God  is  in  Himself,  not  what  we  may  chance 
to  find  Him  in  this  or  that  moment  to  be,  that  is  our  hope. 

Be  not  afraid  to  pray — to  pray  is  right. 
Pray,  if  thou  canst,  with  hope ;  but  ever  pray, 


192    THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

Though  hope  be  weak,  or  sick  with  loDg  delay ; 
Pray  in  the  darkness,  if  there  be  no  light. 
Far  is  the  time,  remote  from  human  sight, 
When  war  and  discord  on  the  earth  shall  cease. 
Yet  every  prayer  for  universal  peace 
Avails  the  blessed  time  to  expedite. 
Whate'er  is  good  to  wish,  ask  that  of  Heaven, 
Though  it  be  what  thou  canst  not  hope  to  see : 
Pray  to  be  perfect,  though  material  leaven 
Forbid  the  spirit  so  on  earth  to  be ; 
But  if  for  any  wish  thou  darest  not  pray, 
Then  pray  to  God  to  cast  that  wish  away.^ 

3.  Love. — Love  to  God,  itself  due  to  God's  own  gift  of 
power  to  love  Him,  is  the  cause  of  that  singleness  of  heart  and 
aim,  that  simple,  downright  obedience,  which  are  essential  to 
acceptable  prayer.  Behind  the  simplicity  of  the  119th  Psalm,  of 
which  the  core  and  centre  is  that  all  life  is  from  God,  for  God, 
and  in  God,  there  is  love.  It  was  love  that  gave  its  author  his 
firmness  in  resolution,  his  keen  insight  into  the  will  of  God,  and 
inspired  the  prayer,  in  form  manifold,  though  one  in  intention, 
that  his  own  will  might  correspond  with  the  "  good  and  accept- 
able and  perfect  will  of  God  ". 

(1)  Love  of  God  is  the  secret  of  power  in  prayer.  The  diffi- 
culties most  often  complained  of  as  hindrances  to  prayer  may  be 
traced  back  to  want  of  love.  Want  of  love  destroys  our  interest 
in  prayer,  so  that  our  thoughts  wander  to  other  things.  Want  of 
love  destroys  our  delight  in  prayer,  so  that  it  becomes  a  weariness 
to  us,  and  our  hearts  find  themselves  cold  and  dry. 

(2)  The  love  in  which  our  Lord  laid  the  foundation  of  prayer 
includes  love  to  man  in  love  to  God.  If  God  is  the  Father  of  us, 
we  should  love  one  another  as  brethren.  Where  the  loving, 
generous  heart  is  given,  there  also  that  forgiving  spirit  on  which 
our  Lord  thrice  insisted  with  repeated  earnestness  as  essential  to 
our  own  forgiveness,  and  therefore  to  the  acceptance  of  our  prayer 
and  ofierings,  will  not  be  withheld 

IT  The  love  that  is  a  constraining  principle  in  life  is  not  ordinary 
commonplace  affection,  but  a  passion  of  love.  The  harder  the 
task,  the  greater  the  love  that  it  demands.     A  comparatively  cold, 

^  Hartley  Coleridge. 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER      193 

intellectual  regard  cannot  do  the  work  of  an  ardent,  glowing 
heart-devotion.  Only  when  love  burns  within  as  a  perpetual  iare 
does  it  generate  the  degree  of  force  needed  to  propel  desires  and 
purposes  over  a  difficult  road  to  their  goal.  Nothing  is  absolutely- 
irresistible  save  love;  and  nothing  else  can  stand  the  strain  of 
a  desperate  and  protracted  contest.  Lesser  motives  tend  to  give 
way  if  too  severely  tried,  but  love  is  equal  to  all  contingencies. 
Therefore  the  cause  that  we  espouse,  the  person  we  would  save 
and  bless,  or  the  purpose  we  would  realize,  must  be  loved  with  a 
passionate  love,  must  be  to  us  as  our  own  soul.  And  when  the 
cause  totters  under  the  heavy  blows  of  the  enemy,  so  that  to  bear 
it  up  becomes  an  almost  intolerable  strain,  love  will  be  found 
equal  to  the  task.  When  the  weakness,  the  defects,  and  un worthi- 
ness of  the  persons  or  communities  we  pray  and  work  for  reveal 
themselves  as  far  beyond  our  worst  fears,  love  will  not  falter,  but 
hopefully,  patiently,  perseveringly  continue  its  ministry.  When 
delays  and  disappointments  obstruct  and  discouragement 
threatens,  love  will  pierce  beyond  the  veil  and  see  the  yet  invis- 
ible success ;  it  will  wax  stronger  and  stronger  in  faith  till,  by 
the  very  pressure  of  its  yearning  intensity,  vision  passes  on  to 
prevision — becoming,  as  in  Browning's  "  Saul,"  prophetic,  and 
wresting  from  the  future  gleams  of  light  and  hope  wherewith  to 
cheer  the  difficult  present.^ 

IV. 

Importunity. 

1.  Prayer  should  be  strenuously  importunate.  Not  petitionary 
merely,  or  concentrated,  or  active  alone,  but  importunate.  For 
prayer  is  not  meditation  or  communion  only.  Nor  ought  it  to  be 
merely  submissive  in  tone,  as  the  "  quietist "  ideal  is.  We  need 
not  begin  with  "  Thy  will  be  done  "  if  we  but  end  with  it.  Re- 
member the  stress  that  Christ  laid  on  importunity.  Strenuous 
prayer  will  help  us  to  recover  the  masculine  type  of  religion, 
and  then  our  opponents  will  at  least  respect  us. 

2.  The  need  of  persevering,  importunate  prayer  appears  to 
some  to  be  at  variance  with  the  faith  which  knows  that  it  has  re- 
ceived what  it  asks  (Mark  xi.  24).  One  of  the  mysteries  of  the 
Divine  life  is  the  harmony  between  the  gradual  and  the  sudden, 

^  L.  Swetenham,  Conquering  Prayer,  200. 
13 


194    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

immediate  full  possession  and  slow  imperfect  appropriation.  And 
so  here  persevering  prayer  appears  to  be  the  school  in  which  the 
soul  is  strengthened  for  the  boldness  of  faith.  And  with  the 
diversity  of  operations  of  the  Spirit  there  may  be  some  in  whom 
faith  takes  more  the  form  of  persistent  waiting,  while  to  others 
triumphant  thanksgiving  appears  the  only  proper  expression  of 
the  assurance  of  having  been  heard. 

(1)  Importunity  is  necessary  for  two  reasons.  First,  because 
prayer  is  not  only  the  satisfaction  of  our  needs  but  the  discharge 
of  a  duty  and  the  test  of  inward  loyalty  towards  God,  the  grace 
of  perseverance  is  essential  to  its  practice.  In  the  searching 
words  of  the  Serious  Call  on  daily  early  prayer,  William  Law 
points  out  that  prayer  is  not  a  question  of  moods  and  fancies, 
but  of  duty  and  discipline,  although  the  sense  of  duty  and  the 
discipline  are  energized  by  love. 

IF  Even  dull  and  spiritless  prayer,  if  only  it  be  faithfully 
persevered  in,  accustoms  the  soul  to  Christ's  Cross  ;  disciplines  it 
against  self,  teaches  it  humility ;  teaches  it  in  the  hidden  way  of 
the  faith.  If  our  prayers  were  always  clear,  if  they  never  lacked 
unction,  feeling,  fervour,  we  should  feed  all  our  lives  through  on 
a  milk  diet  and  lack  the  discipline  of  dry  bread  ;  we  should  seek 
only  the  sweets  and  pleasures  we  could  feel,  instead  of  persisting 
after  self-sacrifice  and  death;  we  should  be  as  the  folk  whom 
Jesus  reproached  because  they  followed  Him  not  for  His  doctrine 
but  for  the  loaves  and  fishes.  Reject  not  the  exercise  of  prayer, 
then,  even  though  your  prayer  appear  spiritless,  dull,  distracted. 
Endure  to  be  bored  patiently,  so  it  be  for  the  love  of  God.  Would 
you  waste  your  time  in  beating  away  the  flies  that  buzz  around 
your  ears  ?  Suffer  them  rather  to  buzz,  and  use  yourself  to  go 
on  with  your  work  as  though  they  were  miles  away.^ 

IF  When  the  self-indulgent  neighbour  endeavoured  to  escape  the 
trouble  of  providing  his  friend  with  three  loaves,  it  was  selfishness 
and  sloth  that  created  the  delay  and  made  the  diflSculty.  When 
the  unjust  judge  over  and  over  again  slighted  the  appeal  of  the 
injured  widow,  it  was  only  reckless  carelessness  and  indifference 
to  the  claims  of  right  and  duty  that  led  him  to  keep  her  waiting. 
But  when  our  heavenly  Father  seems  to  act,  in  some  respects,  as 
they  did,  and  the  longed-for  answer  does  not  appear  to  come,  it 
is  not  selfishness  or  carelessness,  but  love,  that  induces  the  delay, 

1  F^nelon. 


PERSONAL  DEMANDS  OF  PRAYER      195 

in  order  that  the  value  of  the  blessing  may  be  increased  by  im- 
portunity.^ 

(2)  "  Importunity,"  writes  Bishop  Wilson,  "  makes  no  change 
in  God,  but  it  creates  in  us  such  dispositions  as  God  thinks  fit  to 
reward "  ;  and  thus  continuance  in  prayer  becomes  a  test  of 
character.  To  give  up  the  special  request  may  mean  distrust  of 
God,  or  impatience,  or  indolence,  or  even  some  secret  tendency  to 
veiled  rebellion  against  His  will, 

IT  A  child  who  had  wandered  from  a  mountain  road,  in  the 
summer  of  1900,  lost  his  life  among  "the  Brecon  Beacons". 
Had  he  walked  only  a  few  yards  farther  from  the  spot  where  his 
body  at  last  was  found,  he  would  have  seen  his  home  in  the 
valley  just  below  the  mountain,  and  have  been  easily  guided  to 
the  pathway  descending  to  it.  He  paused  in  his  weariness  at  a  point 
where  nothing  met  his  eye  but  the  bare  hills  around.  In  that 
pathetic  incident  is  there  not  a  parable  of  much  spiritual  loss  ? 
The  gift  that  might  have  been  cultivated,  the  blessing  that  might 
have  been  won,  the  grace  by  which  weakness  might  have  been 
transformed  into  strength,  the  temptation  that  might  have  been 
subdued,  the  work  that  might  have  been  so  useful  in  the  Church's 
cause,  lost  at  a  point  where  only  one  more  effort  was  needed  to 
secure  it.  Midway  between  "  the  spirit,"  with  its  upward  aspira- 
tions, and  "the  flesh"  in  our  fallen  state,  with  its  downward 
tendencies,  there  lies  "  the  soul,"  the  scene  of  momentous  decisions 
whether  to  fall  under  **  the  mind  of  the  flesh,"  which  is  death, 
or  under  "the  mind  of  the  spirit,"  empowered  by  the  Divine 
Spirit,  which  is  "  life  and  peace  ".  In  the  years  of  our  conflict, 
the  Lord's  solemn  charge  to  "  watch  and  pray  "  is  a  summons  to 
self -discipline  and  importunity  in  prayer,  but  the  charge  may  be 
linked  with  the  gracious  promise  by  which  He  crowns  endurance 
with  victory :  "  In  your  patience  ye  shall  win  your  souls  ".^ 

IF  I  sat  in  a  quiet  corner  unseen,  with  locked  hands  and  the 
tears  dripping  on  them,  pleading,  pleading,  God  would  use  him 
as  the  instrument  to  draw  those  men  that  night.  Deeper  and 
deeper  grew  the  feeling  as  he  told,  quietly  and  briefly,  the  story 
of  what  he  had  seen  and  heard,  and  what  he  believed  God  was 
doing  in  Wales  and  questioning  was  He  going  to  do  it  in  England  ? 
My  pleading  had  become  a  veritable  agony ;  the  Holy  Spirit's 
brooding  presence  an  awesome  thing  in  its  solemn  intensity, 
when  suddenly  he  said  something  that  held  me  and  drew  me. 

1  Canon  Hay  Aitken,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer,  99. 
'A.  J.  Worlledge,  Prayer,  206. 


196    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

I  lifted  my  head  and  listened — was  transfixed  by  his  face  and 
words — stopped  my  pleading  and  followed  him  intently.  Once 
he  looked  uneasily  towards  me.  I  did  not  know  what  he  meant. 
His  words  were  burning  with  fire  and  beauty.  Then  something 
happened  ;  he  was  swung  off  in  another  direction.  Men  caught 
their  breath,  the  tension  lessened,  he  sat  down,  and  though  every 
soul  was  deeply  moved — scores  of  their  eyes  were  wet — yet  the 
tongues  of  flame  were  held  back ;  they  came  not  that  night. 
And  we  sat,  two  sad  and  disappointed  creatures ;  and  when  at 
last  the  meeting  was  over  and  he  came  down  from  the  platform 
and  reaching  my  side,  he  seized  my  arm  fiercely,  saying,  "  You 
were  praying  for  me  to-night,  were  you  not  ? "  I  nodded.  "  And 
you  stopped  in  the  middle  of  my  speech.  Oh,  why  did  you,  why 
did  you  ?  All  the  power  went  out  of  me,  I  could  feel  it  go,  and 
could  not  imagine  what  was  the  matter  with  me,  till  I  glanced 
at  you  and  saw  you  listening.  Never,  never  do  that  again.  To 
think  we  might  have  been  in  the  thick  of  the  Revival  this  very 
night,  if  you  had  been  faithful."  ^ 

1  Estelle  W.  Stead,  My  Father,  280. 


X. 

Minor  Aids  to  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Abrahams,  I.,  in  Jewish  Addresses  (1904). 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H.,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 

Balch,  A.  E.,  Prayer. 

Boreham,  F.  W.,  Mountains  in  the  Mist  (1914). 

Bounds,  E.  M.,  Pwpose  in  Prayer  (1914). 

Brent,  0.  H.,  With  God  in  the  World  (1899). 

Campbell,  J.  M.,  Responsibility  for  the  Gift  of  Eternal  Life  (1873). 

Douglas,  A.  F.,  Prayer :  A  Practical  Treatise  (1901). 

Drury,  T.  W.,  The  Prison-Ministry  of  St.  Paul  (1911). 

Gordon,  S.  D.,  Quiet  Talks  on  Prayer. 

Gore,  C,  Prayer,  and  the  Lord's  Prayer  (1898). 

Hamilton,  Archbp.,  Catechism  (1552  ;  ed.  T.  G.  Law,  1884). 

Ulingworth,  J.  R.,  Christian  Character  (1904). 

Jackson,  G.,  The  Teaching  of  Jesus  (1903). 

Knight,  G.  H.,  The  Master's  Questions  to  His  Disciples  (1903). 

McComb,  S.,  Christianity  and  the  Modern  Mind  (1910). 

MacEvoy,  C,  The  Way  of  Prayer  (1914). 

Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

,,  ,,         Way  marks  in  the  Pursuit  of  God  (1908). 

Martensen,  H.,  Christian  Ethics^  i.  (1881). 
Murray,  A.,  The  Prayer- Life  (1914). 
Rolle,  R.,  The  Mending  of  Life  (ed.  Harford,  1913). 
Saphir,  A.,  The  Hidden  Life  (1877). 
Swetenham,  L.,  Conquering  Prayer  (1908). 
Thomas,  H.  A.,  in  Faith  and  Criticism  (1893). 
Thomas,  W.  H.  G.,  Life  Abiding  and  Abounding. 
Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 
Churchman,  xx.  (1906)  31  (W.  H.  Dundas). 


198 


Minor  Aids  to  Prayer. 

The  fundamental  conditions  of  prayer  are  the  preference  of 
the  will  of  God  to  our  own  will,  conformity  to  Christ,  and  the 
presence  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  These  and  other  important  claims 
have  already  been  before  us.  Now  we  are  to  consider  certain 
less  necessary  but  very  helpful  conditions  to  true  prayer.  Let 
us  take  them  in  this  order :  Preparation,  Practice,  Definiteness, 
Humility,  Energy,  Patience,  and  Service. 

i.  Preparation. 
The  life  of  prayer  is  a  thing  of  gradual  attainment,  through 
all  the  degrees  that  separate  the  child  who  learns  the  Lord's 
Prayer  by  rote  at  his  mother's  knee  from  the  saint  who,  out  of  great 
tribulation,  has  wrought  his  life  into  a  Lord's  Prayer.  For,  how- 
ever natural  a  function  prayer  may  be  of  our  personality,  it  is 
hard  to  practise  in  our  sinful  state.  We  can  no  more  pray  at 
will,  without  having  carefully  acquired  the  capacity,  than  we 
can  perform  on  a  musical  instrument  that  we  have  never  seen  or 
handled  before.  We  have  therefore  to  learn  to  pray.  The  rudi- 
mentary instinct,  indeed,  is  present  throughout  the  human  race, 
as  we  see  from  the  recorded  history  of  every  people  in  every  age. 
But  its  action  is  often  atrophied,  and  always  spasmodic,  irregular, 
uncertain,  until  it  has  been  trained ;  and  its  training  is  a  laborious 
work. 

IF  Ante  orationem  prcepara  animam  tuam.  The  wisman 
giffis  the  counsale,  O  christin  man  and  woman,  to  prepare  thi 
mynd  afore  thi  prayer.  That  is  to  say,  afore  thow  begyn  to 
mak  thi  prayer,  tak  gud  tent  that  thow  mak  it  with  sic  ane 
mynd,  that  it  may  be  acceptabil  to  God,  and  hard  of  him.  Thair- 
for  thow  sal  understand,  that  thair  is  thre  vertewis,  quhairwith 
thou  suld  prepare  thi  mynd  afore  thi  prayer.  The  first  is  faith. 
The  secund  is  hoip.     The  thrid  is  cherite.^ 

1  Archbishop  Hamilton' i  Catechism,  241. 
199 


200    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

1.  The  best  way  to  learn  to  pray  is  to  practise  praying.  We 
shall  look  at  that  in  a  moment.  But  notice  three  exercises  which 
help  to  bring  us  into  the  right  mind  for  prayer.  And  first, 
Meditation.  To  live  before  God,  to  meditate  on  His  words  and 
works,  to  ascribe  glory  to  His  name,  revealed  to  us  now  fully, 
is  impossible  without  the  transition  of  this  state  of  realizing  God 
into  the  act  of  prayer.  Meditation  is  the  necessary  basis  and 
element  out  of  which  prayer  proceeds,  and  into  which  it  returns. 

IT  "Shut  thy  door."  The  reason  is  plain.  He  who  would 
pray  must  first  retire :  the  spirit  of  the  world  and  the  spirit  of 
prayer  are  contrary  the  one  to  the  other.  Business  or  pleasure, 
or  even  common  conversation  if  it  continue  for  any  long  time, 
will  strangely  indispose  the  mind  for  devotion ;  and  the  soul, 
before  she  can  take  her  flight  to  heaven,  must  plume  and  balance 
her  wings  by  holy  meditation ;  she  must  rally  her  scattered  and 
dissipated  thoughts,  and  fix  them  on  the  business  she  is  going 
about ;  she  must  consider  the  nature  of  God  to  whom  she  is  to 
pray ;  of  herself  who  is  to  pray  to  Him  :  she  must  know  the  sins 
she  has  been  guilty  of  to  confess  them ;  and  the  grace  she  stands 
in  need  of  to  petition  for  it.  All  this  is  not  to  be  done  but  by 
deep  meditation,  which  is  the  mother  of  devotion  and  the 
daughter  of  retirement.  They  who  do  not  meditate  cannot  pray ; 
and  they  who  do  not  retire  can  do  neither.^ 

IT  Here  be  those  men  reproved  that  give  them  more  to  medi- 
tation than  to  prayer.  They  know  not  that  God's  word  is  full  of 
fire,  and  may  purge  the  filth  of  sin.  Also  the  souls  of  them  that 
pray  be  inflamed  with  love,  and  though  we  may  not  bring  our 
heart  into  stableness  and  sadness  [i.e.  stedfastness]  of  prayer  soon 
as  we  will,  yet  shall  we  not  leave  off*  our  prayer,  but  we  shall 
waxen  by  little  and  little,  and  at  the  last  Christ  of  His  goodness 
will  put  our  heart  in  stedfastness  ;  and  to  this  helpeth  meditation, 
if  it  be  reasonable  and  measurable.^ 

2.  Fasting  is  to  be  used.  Now,  as  ordinarily  employed,  the 
term  "fasting"  stands  for  abstinence  from  food  and  from  certain 
forms  of  pleasure  that  appeal  to  the  senses.  By  this  abstinence 
it  is  believed  that  the  spirit  grows  stronger  and  is  furthered  in 
its  efforts  to  reach  out  into  the  unseen  and  the  invisible.  This 
view  is  true  as  far  as  it  goes,  but  we  look  instinctively  for  a 
deeper  significance,  and  we  find  that  fasting  is  a  symbol  of  tre- 

*  Bishop  Home.  ^  Richard  Rolle,  The  Mending  of  Life,  48. 


MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER  201 

mendous  import.  In  its  highest  aspect  it  represents  that  inward 
act  of  supreme  self-abnegation  by  which,  in  view  of  some  stupen- 
dous undertaking  which  demands  the  concentrated  force  of  his 
entire  nature,  a  man  withdraws,  for  a  while,  all  his  energies  and 
interests  from  the  various  spheres  in  which  they  are  operating, 
and  brings  them  to  bear  upon  the  single  task  before  him. 

^  Fasting  represents  an  attitude  of  detachment  from  the  things 
of  time  and  sense,  whether  it  be  from  food,  or  pleasure,  or  lawful 
ambition.  Prayer  represents  the  complementary  attitude  of 
attachment  to  the  things  of  God  and  the  spiritual  world.  When 
we  thus  realize  our  need  of  detachment  from  earth  we  shall 
readily  determine,  under  the  guidance  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  what 
particular  forms  our  fasting  shall  take.  In  the  times  of  our 
Puritan  forefathers  the  spiritual  value  of  fasting  from  food 
was  fully  realized,  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  whatever  of  the 
relation  of  physical  food  to  spiritual  blessing.  The  sin  of  over- 
eating is  only  too  apt  to  hinder  spiritual  power  in  prayer,  while  if 
we  "  keep  under  the  body  "  we  shall  certainly  be  conscious  of 
more  liberty  and  blessing  as  we  fulfil  our  work  of  prayer  and 
intercession.  What  we  need  concerning  food,  dress,  books,  re- 
creation, friendship,  ambition,  is  the  resolute  determination  to  be 
above  them,  superior  to  them,  in  order  that  the  spiritual  may 
rule  everything.  Like  St.  Paul,  we  should  say,  "  All  things  are 
lawful  for  me ;  but  I  will  not  be  brought  under  the  power  of 
any"  (1  Cor.  vi.  12).  This  is  the  true  idea  of  fasting,  and  in  this 
spirit  of  detachment  from  things  earthly  we  obtain  one  of  the 
true  accompaniments  of,  and  helps  to,  that  spirit  of  attachment 
to  God  which  is  found  in  prayer.^ 

3.  Prayer  may  often  be  profitably  preceded  by  the  reading 
of  Scripture.  No  other  book  is  such  a  mirror  both  of  man  and 
of  God.  Here  we  see  our  own  countenance,  and  we  are  humbled ; 
here  we  see  the  countenance  of  God,  and  we  are  comforted.  Here 
we  behold  the  human  heart,  with  its  unbelief,  its  selfish  and 
carnal  thoughts,  its  tendency  to  hypocrisy,  to  seek  rest  in  mere 
shadows.  In  reading  Scripture,  we  feel  in  the  presence  of  Him 
before  whose  eyes  all  things  are  naked  and  open.  The  Word  is 
like  a  sharp  sword  ;  all  that  is  confused  and  mixed  in  our  thoughts 
and  hearts  is  severed,  the  heavenly  separated  from  the  earthly, 
and  the  thoughts  and  intents  of  the  hearts  discerned.  When  in 
this  Book  we  read  the  experiences  of  God's  people,  the  patriarchs, 
^  W.  H.  Griffith  Thomas,  Life  Abiding  afid  Abounding^  96. 


202    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

the  wanderings  of  Israel  in  the  wilderness,  the  life  of  David,  we  feel 
that  we  are  reading  our  own  history.  As  Ulysses  wept  when  he 
heard  his  own  sorrows  recited  by  the  minstrel  at  the  court  of 
King  Alcinous,  so,  as  we  read  in  Scripture  of  the  sins,  failures, 
hopes,  and  fears  of  God's  children,  we  see  our  own  hearts  and 
lives.  When  the  inner  life  of  God  s  saints  is  unveiled  to  us,  as  in 
the  Psalms,  the  Book  of  Job,  the  Lamentations  of  Jeremiah,  and 
indeed  throughout  Scripture,  so  that,  as  Luther  says,  "  we  see 
into  the  very  hearts  of  these  men,  and  not  merely  behold  para- 
dise and  heaven  itself  there,  but  also  death,  and  even  hell,"  we 
possess  in  these  apparently  subjective  and  purely  human  delinea- 
tions the  teaching  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  who  presents  to  us  truth- 
fully and  perfectly  the  conflict  in  human  souls  between  God's 
grace  and  their  sin  and  weakness,  and  provides  us  with  a  guide- 
book, in  which  all  possible  difficulties  and  errors  are  noticed,  and 
the  true  remedies  and  correctives  indicated. 

IF  Little  of  the  Word,  with  little  prayer,  is  death  to  the 
spiritual  life.  Much  of  the  Word,  with  little  prayer,  gives  a  sickly 
life.  Much  prayer  with  little  of  the  Word  gives  more  life,  but 
without  stedfastness.  A  full  measure  of  the  Word  and  prayer 
each  day  give  a  healthy  and  powerful  life.^ 

IF  I  have  often  noticed  how  frequently  in  Wesley's  hymns, 
which  are  surely  a  storehouse  of  devotional  utterance,  the  prayer 
has  been  suggested  by  a  text.  The  poet's  eye  has  caught  the  full 
beauty  of  the  idea  concealed  in  some  almost  unnoticed  text,  and, 
as  in  a  moment,  the  spiritual  aspiration  converts  the  text  into  a 
prayer,  that  is  all  the  more  effectual  because  it  is  the  inspired 
child  of  an  inspiration.^ 

ii.  Practice. 
The  mental  or  moral  effort  involved  in  concentration  of  the 
mind  on  spiritual  things  becomes  easier  by  repetition,  like  any 
other  habit,  and,  like  any  other  habit,  it  is  achieved,  as  a  rule, 
gradually  and  after  many  a  fall.  For  if  prayer  be  in  essence  the 
voluntary  turning  of  the  soul  to  God,  it  needs  no  long  or  elabor- 
ate use  of  words.  It  may  be,  as  the  hymn  says,  only  "  the  burden 
of  a  sigh,  the  falling  of  a  tear  ".  We  can  begin  to  acquire  the 
art  of  prayer  by  learning,  as  it  were,  its  alphabet.     Scattered 

^  Andrew  Murray,  The  Prayer-Life,  100. 

«  Canon  Hay  Aitken,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer,  307. 


MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER  503 

throughout  the  pages  of  the  Bible  and  the  Prayer-Book  and  the 
great  classics  of  Christian  devotion  will  be  found  many  a  brief 
but  pregnant  phrase  or  sentence  on  which  our  spirits  can  wing 
their  way  to  the  heart  of  the  Father  in  heaven. 

"  Create  in  me  a  clean  heart,  O  God  ; 
And  renew  a  right  spirit  within  me." 

"  Search  me,  O  God,  and  know  my  heart : 
Try  me,  and  know  my  thoughts : 
And  see  if  there  be  any  wicked  way  in  me, 
And  lead  me  in  the  way  everlasting." 

"  God  be  merciful  to  me  a  sinner." 

"  Lord,  I  believe  ;  help  thou  mine  unbelief." 

*'  Father,  I  have  sinned  against  heaven,  and  before  thee. 
And  am  no  more  worthy  to  be  called  thy  son." 

"  O  send  out  thy  light  and  thy  truth ; 
That  they  may  lead  me." 

These  brief  sentences  are  typical  of  many  at  our  disposal.  Be- 
ginning with  such  as  these,  we  can  gradually  extend  the  scope 
of  our  prayer  until  the  habit  becomes  as  essential  to  our  spiritual 
life  as  food  and  exercise  are  to  the  life  of  the  body.  But  not 
only  is  the  art  of  prayer  difficult  of  attainment  conceived  as  an 
exercise  of  mind  ;  much  of  the  failure  in  prayer  that  we  deplore 
is  owing  to  absence  of  that  moral  condition  out  of  which  alone 
true  prayer  can  spring.  This  condition  is  absolute  sincerity, 
perfect  truthfulness.  For  the  things  about  which  we  pray  to 
God  are  the  most  sacred  intimacies  of  life — the  sins  we  have  com- 
mitted and  the  uncommitted  sins  we  have  imagined ;  the  self- 
created  difficulties  in  the  management  of  our  own  characters ; 
our  refusal  to  live  up  to  the  level  of  visions  that  have  come  to  us 
in  moments  of  insight  and  inspiration  ;  the  cowardice  which  has 
shrimk  from  opportunities  of  service  to  our  fellow-men,  or  things 
more  poignant  still — the  harsh  words  we  have  spoken  and  the 
unloving  acts  we  have  done  to  loved  ones  now  beyond  the  reach 
of  our  penitence  ;  the  lack  of  a  large  and  generous  and  forgiving 
spirit  to  those  who  are  still  with  us  ;  the  inarticulate  hungerings 
and  thirstings  for  redemption  from  ourselves,  from  the  bondage 
of  evil,  for  reconciliation  with  God  and  the  world.     But  to  think 


204    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

truly  and  honestly  about  these  things,  to  throw  off  the  subtle 
disguises  with  which  self-seeking  would  deceive  us,  demands  an 
integrity  and  singleness  of  mind  that  are  certainly  not  the  work 
of  a  few  brief,  hurried  moments.  It  is  here  that  the  sad  contra- 
diction which  we  see  in  some  lives  finds  its  explanation.  The 
defender  of  prayer  is  pointed  to  persons  brought  up  under  the 
influence  of  religion,  and  finding  an  apparent  pleasure  in  the 
exercises  of  religion,  who  yet  remain  hard,  selfish,  un-Christlike. 
What  value  can  prayer  have,  it  is  triumphantly  asked,  when  it 
has  failed  to  renew  those  with  whom  it  has  been  a  custom  for 
years  ?  The  answer  is  obvious.  Prayer  itself,  in  the  case  of 
these  persons,  has  become  degraded  to  the  low  level  on  which 
their  lives  are  led.  It  is  implicated  in  their  general  insincerity  of 
character.  Having  never  come  face  to  face  with  their  real  selves 
their  praying  has  not  been  real.  It  has  been  that  most  hateful 
of  all  things,  shallow  make-believe. 

^  Prayer  is  a  trade  to  be  learned.  We  must  be  apprentices 
and  serve  our  time  at  it.  Painstaking  care,  much  thought, 
practice  and  labour  are  required  to  be  a  skilful  tradesman  in 
praying.  Practice  in  this,  as  well  as  in  all  other  trades,  makes 
perfect.  Toiling  hands  and  hearts  alone  make  proficients  in  this 
heavenly  trade.  ^ 

^  It  was  a  great  musician  who  said  that  if  he  omitted  his 
six-hours-a-day  practice  for  one  day  he  knew  it,  if  he  omitted  it 
for  two  days  the  critics  knew  it,  and  if  he  omitted  it  for  three 
days  the  public  knew  it. 

The  mighty  pyramids  of  stone 

That  wedge-like  cleave  the  desert  airs, 

When  nearer  seen,  and  better  known, 
Are  but  gigantic  flights  of  stairs. 

The  heights  by  great  men  reached  and  kept 
Were  not  attained  by  sudden  flight. 

But  they,  while  their  companions  slept, 
Were  toiling  upward  in  the  night. 

So  it  is  with  prayer.  It  is,  in  its  highest  potency,  the  fruit 
of  a  long  self -discipline  and  practice.  ^ 

^  E.  M.  Bounds,  Purpose  in  Prayer,  48. 

2  Cuthbert  MacEvoy,  The  Way  of  Prayer,  38. 


MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER  205 

iii.   Definiteness. 

"  Let  your  requests  be  made  known  unto  God  " — St.  Paul  has 
definite  items  of  prayer  in  mind,  and  so  had  Epaphras,  and  so 
must  we  have.  The  command  "  Pray  without  ceasing  "  might 
lead  to  our  being  content  with  a  mere  mental  attitude,  a  general 
consent  to  prayer  which  is  possible  to  the  most  careless  minds. 
But  intention  to  pray  can  never  supply  the  place  of  attention  to 
our  prayers.  A  passive  desire  to  live  in  the  atmosphere  of  prayer 
is  dangerous  unless  it  finds  its  proper  activity  in  definite  exercises 
of  prayer. 

"  Making  mention  of  thee  in  my  prayers  " — does  this  not 
bring  us  near  to  the  secret  of  prevailing  prayer  ?  We  are  afraid 
to  be  individual  and  particular ;  we  lose  ourselves  in  large 
generalities,  until  our  prayers  die  of  very  vagueness.  There 
is  surely  a  more  excellent  way.  "  My  God,"  Paul  wrote  to  the 
Philippians,  ''shall  fulfil  " — not  merely  ''all  your  need,"  as  the 
Authorized  Version  has  it,  but — "  every  need  of  yours."  There 
is  a  fine  discrimination  in  the  Divine  love  which  sifts  and  sorts 
men's  needs,  and  applies  itself  to  them  one  by  one,  just  as  the 
need  may  be.  And  when  in  prayer  we  speak  to  God,  let  it  be 
not  only  of  "all  our  need,"  flung  in  one  great,  careless  heap 
before  Him,  but  of  "  every  need  of  ours,"  each  one  named  by  its 
name,  and  all  spread  out  in  order  before  Him. 

IT  Direct  appeal  to  God  can  only  be  justified  when  it  is  pas- 
sionate. To  come  maundering  into  His  presence  when  we  have 
nothing  particular  to  say  is  an  insult  upon  which  we  should 
never  presume  if  we  had  a  petition  to  offer  to  any  earthly  per- 
sonage.^ 

IF  Suppose  that  a  number  of  petitioners  should  go  to  the  legis- 
lature with  a  petition  worded  thus :  "  We  humbly  pray  your 
honourable  house  to  do  everything  for  the  nation,  to  take  infinite 
care  of  it,  to  let  the  affairs  of  the  nation  tax  your  attention  day 
and  night,  and  lavish  all  your  resources  upon  the  people  ".  Sup- 
pose that  a  petition  like  that  should  be  handed  in  to  the  House 
of  Commons,  what  would  be  the  fate  of  it  ?  It  would  be  laughed 
down,  and  the  only  reason  why  the  petitioners  should  not  be 
confined  to  Bedlam  would  be  lest  their  insanity  should  alarm  the 
inmates.  That  is  not  a  petition.  It  is  void  by  generality ;  by 
referring  to  all  it  misses  everything.     You  must  specify  what 

*  Mark  Rutherford. 


2o6    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

you  want  when  you  go  to  the  legislature.  You  must  state  your 
case  with  clearness  of  definition,  and  with  somewhat  of  argument. 
If  it  be  so  in  our  social  or  political  prayers,  shall  we  go  to  Almighty 
God  with  a  vagueness  which  means  nothing,  with  a  generality 
which  makes  no  special  demand  upon  His  heart  ?  ^ 

IT  A  mother  who  had  been  long  anxious  for  her  son's  conver- 
sion, and  had  long  prayed  for  this  blessing,  was  sitting  one  even- 
ing in  the  large  hall  of  the  Carrubber's  Close  Mission  Buildings. 
As  she  sat  listening  to  the  speaker  of  the  evening  the  desire  for 
her  boy's  conversion  presented  itself  very  strongly  to  her  mind. 
She  prayed  the  Lord  that  He  might  graciously  lead  her  son  to  the 
meeting  that  evening,  and  that  a  particular  worker  might  speak 
to  him.  At  the  close  of  the  service,  and  while  the  inquiry  meet- 
ing was  going  on,  she  turned  round  to  see  what  was  being  done. 
What  was  her  astonishment  to  see  her  son  seated  there  in  a  back 
seat,  and  this  particular  worker  who  had  been  in  her  prayers 
quietly  speaking  to  him.  At  this  glad  sight  she  calmly  settled 
herself  down  to  prayer  again  that  the  Lord  that  night  might  lead 
him  to  decision.  Need  we  say  that  that  night  she  had  the  joy  of 
knowing  that  her  son  had  accepted  Jesus  as  his  Saviour  ?  ^ 

iv.  Humility. 

In  marvellous  language  the  Divine  Presence  is  pledged  to  the 
humble  :  "  Thus  saith  the  high  and  lofty  One  that  inhabiteth 
eternity,  whose  name  is  Holy :  I  dwell  in  the  high  and  holy 
place,  with  him  also  that  is  of  a  contrite  and  humble  spirit, 
to  revive  the  spirit  of  the  humble,  and  to  revive  the  heart  of 
the  contrite  ones  ".  The  figures  of  the  "  poor  "  whose  "  cry  "  is 
not  forgotten,  of  the  "meek"  whose  **  desire"  is  heard,  of  the 
"  humble  "  to  whom  grace  is  given,  meet  us  constantly  in  psalm, 
and  prophecy,  and  epistle.  If  our  Lord,  as  we  have  seen,  encouraged 
hope.  His  was  the  hand  which  drew  the  picture  of  the  worshipper 
"standing  afar  off,"  who  "  would  not  lift  up  so  much  as  his  eyes 
unto  heaven,  but  smote  his  breast,  saying,  God,  be  merciful  to 
me  a  sinner  ". 

Our  Lord  has  not  only  warned  us  of  the  pride  of  the  Pharisee 
who  in  prayer  thanked  God  that  he  was  not  like  other  men  ;  He 
has,  besides,  warned  us  against  ambition,  which  often  occurs  in 
believing  disciples  who  desire  that  God  would  give  them  a  pro- 

^  Joseph  Parker. 

"^  William  Robertson  of  Carrubber's  Close  Mission,  142. 


MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER  207 

minent  position  before  others.  The  sons  of  Zebedee  (Mark  x. 
35  ff.),  who  entreat  the  Lord,  "  Grant  unto  us  that  we  may  sit, 
one  on  thy  right  hand,  and  the  other  on  thy  left  hand,  in  thy 
glory,"  receive  a  correction  ("  Ye  know  not  what  ye  ask  "),  to 
which  the  Lord  adds  the  words,  "  To  sit  on  my  right  hand  and 
on  my  left  hand  is  not  mine  to  give  ;  but  (only  to  those  shall  it 
be  given)  for  whom  it  is  prepared  ".  And  with  this  our  Lord  has, 
once  for  all,  rejected  all  vain  fantastically  ambitious  prayers, 
although  that  ambition  may  give  itself  out  as  a  holy  ambition. 
But  the  exhortation  here  contained,  to  be  satisfied  with  God's 
grace,  is  specially  applicable  also  to  a  longing  often  appearing  in 
the  course  of  Church  History,  namely,  for  signs  and  wonders,  as 
a  fruit  of  prayer  (that  is,  for  surprising,  as  it  were  tangible, 
answers  to  prayer),  or  for  raptures,  visions,  and  revelations  in 
prayer.  It  is  applicable  to  religious  voluptuousness,  to  religious 
eudsemonism,  which  is  always  merely  longing  to  have  blessed  ex- 
periences in  prayer,  to  receive  lively  impressions  and  feelings 
of  the  sweetness  of  God's  love,  like  a  lover  who  every  moment 
desires  new  tokens  of  love,  new  proofs,  new  assurances  that  he 
is  really  loved,  without  considering  that  it  belongs  to  the  very 
essence  of  true  love  to  believe  in  love  even  when  no  special  signs 
of  it  appear  ;  nay,  when  seeming  signs  of  the  opposite  occur. 

Nothing  is  more  beautiful,  nothing  more  encouraging,  than 
the  prayer,  with  the  answer  given  to  it,  of  a  man  in  whom 
strength  of  character  is  matched  by  the  humility  of  a  child.  In 
recent  biography,  no  example  is  more  striking  than  that  of 
Bishop  John  Selwyn,  whose  life  from  early  boyhood  to  its  suffer- 
ing close  was  moulded  by  prayer.  One  incident,  in  which  the 
answer  to  prayer  was  immediate  and  visible,  gives  a  glimpse  into 
the  secret  forces  of  such  a  character.  The  Bishop  was,  at  the 
moment,  in  doubt  whether  or  not  he  should  land  at  Nukapu,  an 
island  in  the  group  where  Bishop  Patteson  had  met  his  death. 
He  did  not  trust  to  his  own  courage,  or  experience,  or  resource. 
"  As  the  mission  party  were  deliberating,  while  the  canoes  of  the 
islanders  surrounded  *  the  Southern  Cross,' "  an  eye-witness  wrote, 
"the  Bishop  left  the  deck,  and  went  below  into  the  cabin,  and 
presently  I  looked  through  the  skylight,  and  there  saw  the  Bishop 
on  his  knees,  and  that  strong  earnest  look  upon  his  face  which 
we  all  knew  so  well,  asking  God  to  direct  him  in  this  matter. 


ao8     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

Whilst,  ho  was  there  prayiiif::,  the  canoes  all  cleared  off,  and  went 
back  to  the  island,  so  that  when  he  came  on  deck  again  the  dis- 
appearance of  the  canoes  settled  the  (question.  The  natives  of 
this  island  were  at  that  time  evidently  most  nervous  and  sus- 
picious, and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  it  would  have  been  unwise 
and  running:  an  unnecessary  risk  to  have  tested  them  too  severely 
on  that  tirst  occasion." 

IF  Humility  is  not  a  mere  passive  virtue,  it  is  active  and 
strenuous ;  it  goes  alx>ut  doing  good.  For  humility  in  its 
workiuii  is  simply  love  in  self-forgotfulness,  love  spending  and 
Iviiii;  spout .  without  any  rotlex  thought  flung  back  upon  itself. 
It  toils  ;in*l  sutr(i\s.  "hoping  for  nothing  again ".  Humility 
may  sonutinus  si^h  when  its  gift^  are  spurned;  sometimes, 
even,  it  may  ho  tempted  to  remonstrate,  though  the  more 
abundant  1\  I  lo\  (^  you.  t]\o  less  I  be  loved  ;  but  it  does  not  there- 
Un-c  ccA^c  from  In  U(Mic\  lu'-.  Humility  is  never  oflended.  It  never 
]>uts  :\u  uui^euerous  I'oust ruction  upon  words  and  acts.  It 
does  not  grow  Iretlul  when  it  is  misunderstood  or  slighted. 
It  loves  on,  and  '*  ]ov(^  ue\  er  taileth  ".  It  is  so  far  from  reading  a 
reference  to  itself  into  the  eomhiet  of  others  that  it  does  not  con- 
sider itself  at  all.  This  earth  shines  outwards  towards  the  other 
planets  with  a  light  which  wt^  w  ho  walk  on  its  surface  have  never 
seen.  And  humility  is  ignor aiu  that  ius  face  is  radiant  in  the 
summer  light  of  God.^ 

IT  "  Did  you  get  low  enough  to  be  blessed?  **  was  the  question 
once  asked  by  a  saintly  man,  when  speaking  to  some  who  had 
gathered  to  pray  for  a  revival  in  the  Church.  "  Low  enough  to 
be  blessed " — ttiat  is  what  God  is  often  waiting  for,  before  an 
answer  to  my  prayers  can  come.  **  Lord,  give  me  loftier  views  of 
Christ,**  is  the  cry  of  some  eager  heart ;  and  God  says,  "  Yes,  I 
will ;  but  first  you  must  have  deeper  and  more  humbling  views 
of  yourself".  "Lord,  use  me  to  do  great  things  for  Thee'*. 
**  Yes,  but  are  you  completely  willing  to  be  only  the  tool,  and  not 
the  hand  that  moves  it?  **  "Lord,  I  would  fain  be  full  of  the 
Holy  Ghost  and  of  power ;  wilt  Thou  make  me  a  brilliant  lamp, 
giving  clear  and  steady  light  ?  **  "  Yes,  but  I  must  first  empty 
you  w  all  your  own  oil,  and  so  make  room  for  that  fulness  of  the 
Spirit  to  get  in."  ^ 

1 D.  M.  Molniyn,  Waymarfu  in  ik$  Pursuit  of  Qody  311. 
*  O.  H.  Knight,  TU  MasUrU  Quuivm^  to  His  DiscipUs,  19. 


MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER  209 

V.  Energy. 
The  call  to  prayer  means  a  call  to  work,  not  a  summons  to  set 
a-going  a  machine  which  needs  neither  brain  nor  heart.  It  is  a 
call  to  gather  up  all  the  forces  of  the  soul,  and  to  summon  them  to 
the  intenseat  activity.  It  is  indeed  the  highest  exercise  to  which 
a  man  can  be  called.  Remark  the  expressions  used  in  Scripture 
to  describe  prayer.  When  Jacob  prayed  it  is  said  that  he 
wrestled — "  and  he  said,  I  will  not  let  thee  go,  except  thou  bless 
me".  In  the  Psalms  the  suppliant  cries — "cries  with  a  loud 
voice  ".  "I  am  weary  with  my  crying ;  my  throat  is  dried : 
mine  eyes  fail  while  I  wait  for  my  God."  Elijah,  though  a  man 
of  like  passions  with  us,  "  prayed  fervently  ".  The  prayer  which 
availeth  much  in  its  working  is  the  supplication  of  the  righteous 
man.  Such  is  the  expressive  language  in  which  prayer  is  spoken 
of  in  Scripture,  certainly  teaching  us  the  greatness  of  the  work 
to  which  we  are  called  when  we  are  summoned  to  pray.  Of 
Bishop  Hamilton  of  Salisbury  it  is  told  how,  with  all  his  deep 
insight  into  spiritual  things,  he  was  accustomed  to  say  that  no 
man  was  likely  to  do  much  good  in  prayer  who  did  not  begin  by 
looking  upon  it  in  the  light  of  a  work,  to  be  prepared  for  and 
persevered  in  with  all  the  earnestness  which  we  bring  to  bear 
upon  subjects  which  are,  in  our  opinion,  at  once  most  interesting 
and  most  necessary. 

IF  Be  certain  that  it  is  the  pure  mind  we  set  to  perceive.  The 
God  discerned  in  thought  is  another  than  he  of  the  senses.  And 
let  the  prayer  be  as  a  little  fountain.  Rising  on  a  spout,  from 
dread  of  the  hollow  below,  the  prayer  may  be  prolonged  in  words 
begetting  words,  and  have  a  pulse  of  fervour ;  the  spirit  of  it  has 
fallen  after  the  first  jet.  That  is  the  delirious  energy  of  our 
craving,  which  has  no  life  in  our  souls.  We  do  not  get  to  any 
heaven  by  renouncing  the  Mother  we  spring  from ;  and  when 
there  is  an  eternal  secret  for  us,  it  is  best  to  believe  that  Earth 
knows,  to  keep  near  her,  even  in  our  utmost  aspirations.^ 

IT  It  is  productive  of  much  mischief  to  try  to  make  people  be- 
lieve that  the  life  of  prayer  is  easy.  In  reality  there  is  nothing 
quite  so  difficult  as  strong  prayer,  nothing  so  worthy  of  the  at- 
tention and  the  exercise  of  all  the  fine  parts  of  a  great  manhood. 
On  the  other  hand,  there  is  no  man  who  is  not  equal  to  the  task. 
So  splendid  has  this  human  nature  of  ours  become  through  the 

^  George  Meredith. 
14 


2IO    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

Incarnation  that  it  can  bear  any  strain  and  meet  any  demand 
that  God  sees  fit  to  put  upon  it.  Some  duties  are  individual  and 
special,  and  there  is  exemption  from  them  for  the  many,  but  there 
is  never  any  absolution  from  a  duty  for  which  a  man  has  a  capa- 
city. There  is  one  universal  society,  the  Church,  for  v^hich  all 
are  eligible,  and  with  which  all  are  bound  to  unite ;  there  is  one 
universal  book,  the  Bible,  which  all  can  understand,  and  which  it 
is  the  duty  of  all  to  read ;  there  is  one  universal  art,  prayer,  in 
which  all  may  become  well  skilled  and  to  the  acquirement  of  which 
all  must  bend  their  energies.^ 

IT  I  remember  once,  in  the  early  summer  of  1884,  seeing  a 
sight  in  India  which  made  a  permanent  impression  on  my  mind. 
In  the  modern  busy  street  in  Calcutta,  called  Bow  Bazaar,  in 
which  the  Oxford  Mission  House  used  to  stand,  I  saw  by  the  side 
of  the  tram-line  a  man,  stark  naked,  with  chains  round  feet  and 
hands.  He  was  lying  flat  in  the  dust,  measuring  his  length  on 
the  ground.  He  rose  as  I  was  looking,  advanced  a  few  paces, 
and,  standing  upright,  with  his  feet  where  his  nose  had  marked 
the  dust,  he  prostrated  himself  again,  and  proceeded  to  go  through 
the  same  motions.  He  was  a  fakir  or  devotee  of  some  sort,  and 
I  was  assured  that  he  was  going  to  travel  in  this  manner  all  the 
hundreds  of  weary  miles  which  intervene  between  Calcutta  and 
the  sacred  city  of  Benares.  My  first  feeling  was,  I  fear,  one  of 
disgust  and  contempt  at  the  superstitious  folly  of  the  man.  But 
I  hope  it  was  soon  overtaken  and  checked  by  a  consideration 
both  worthier  and  with  more  of  humility  in  it — the  consideration, 
I  mean,  that  he,  in  his  belated  ignorance  of  the  character  of  God 
and  of  the  way  to  serve  Him,  was  taking  a  great  deal  more  pains 
about  his  devotions  than  I  was  in  the  habit  of  doing  with  my 
better  knowledge.^ 

U  Livingstone  reports  of  Robert  Bruce  that  in  prayer  "  every 
sentence  was  like  a  strong  bolt  shot  up  to  heaven  ".  The  biographer 
of  Richard  Baxter  tells  us  that  when  he  gathered  his  spirit  to- 
gether to  pray,  it  "  took  wing  for  heaven  ".  And  it  is  related  in 
similar  terms  of  Archbishop  Leighton  that  "  his  manner  of  pray- 
ing was  so  earnest  and  importunate  as  proved  that  his  soul 
mounted  up  to  God  in  the  flame  of  his  own  aspirations  ".  Henry 
Martyn  notes  in  his  diary  that,  having  set  apart  a  day  for  fasting 
and  humiliation,  he  began  to  pray  for  the  establishment  of  the 
Divine  Kingdom  upon  earth,  with  particular  mention  of  India. 
He  received  so  great  enlargement,  and  had  such  energy  and  de- 

1  Bishop  Brent,  With  God  in  the  World,  1. 

*  Bishop  Gore,  Prayer,  arid  tlie  Lord's  Prayer,  3. 


MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER  211 

light  in  prayer  as  he  had  never  before  experienced.  He  adds, 
"  My  whole  soul  wrestled  with  God.  I  knew  not  how  to  leave  off 
crying  to  Him  to  fulfil  His  promises,  chiefly  pleading  His  own 
glorious  power."  ^ 

vi.  Patience, 
To  earnestness  and  effort  in  prayer  add  patient  expectation. 
To  say  that  we  are  earnest  in  our  prayer  is  just  to  say  that 
we  conceive  ourselves  good ;  in  being  earnest,  people  think 
they  have  done  their  part,  and  that  they  have  manifested 
a  right  feeling  when  they  have  asked  a  thing  sincerely  and 
pleaded  hard  for  it.  But  their  earnestness  proves  only  some- 
thing about  themselves  and  their  own  choice  of  good  things,  not 
any  confidence  in  God's  goodness  or  love.  Prayer  is  the  offering 
of  our  desires  to  God  for  things  according  to  His  will ;  and  our 
concluding  with  the  word  "  Amen  ! "  is  understood  to  express  our 
confidence  that  God  both  hears  our  prayers  and  will  answer  them. 
Whatever  God  has  revealed  to  us  as  a  subject  for  prayer  He  has 
placed  within  our  reach.  To  ask  God  for  a  thing,  not  believing 
that  He  is  willing  to  give  it,  is  to  go  not  on  God's  promise  but  on 
a  venture.  The  most  familiar,  and  perhaps  the  most  impressive, 
description  of  prayer  in  the  Old  Testament  is  found  in  those 
numerous  passages  where  the  life  of  intercourse  with  God  is 
spoken  of  as  a  waiting  upon  Him.  Professor  A.  B.  Davidson  has 
given  a  beautiful  definition  of  waiting  upon  God :  "  To  wait  is 
not  merely  to  remain  passive.  It  is  to  expect — to  look  for  with 
patience,  and  also  with  submission.  It  is  to  long  for,  but  not  im- 
patiently ;  to  look  for,  but  not  to  fret  at  the  delay ;  to  watch 
for,  but  not  restlessly ;  to  feel  that  if  He  does  not  come  we  will 
acquiesce,  and  yet  to  refuse  to  let  the  mind  acquiesce  in  the  feel- 
ing that  He  will  not  come." 

IF  The  discovery  of  the  Hebrew  original  of  the  Apocryphal 
book  known  as  Ecclesiasticus  has  restored  an  interesting  text  to 
us:  Sirach  vii.  10,  "Be  not  impatient  in  prayer".  It  is  lost  in 
the  Greek  version  but  the  Hebrew  preserves  it.  Be  not  impatient 
in  prayer.  It  is  one  of  the  wisest  things  ever  said  on  the  subject. 
Impatient  our  prayer  mostly  is ;  yet  impatience  destroys  at  least 
the  half  of  our  prayer's  worth.     The  Hebrew  noun  tephillah, 

1  D.  M.  Mclntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  129. 


212     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

"prayer,"  is  of  the  same  root  as  the  Hebrew  verb  for  "judge," 
"  arbitrate ".  An  element  of  judgment  or  deliberation  is  the 
requisite  complement  to  the  flow,  the  rush  of  spiritual  emotion. 
The  two  elements — consideration  and  free  abandonment,  restraint 
and  impulse — must  go  together  to  compose  the  genuine  idea  of 
prayer.  Impatience  is  the  child's  posture.  Tom  Tulliver's  faith 
in  prayer  broke  down  when,  after  praying  in  bed  overnight  for 
Divine  help,  he  still  could  not  remember  his  Latin  verbs  in  school 
next  day.  We  must  approach  God  as  children :  simple,  reliant, 
trustful.  But  we  must  not  approach  Him  childishly.  "Wait 
thou  for  the  Lord,"  says  the  Psalmist ;  or,  as  the  fine  English 
Prayer-Book  version  has  it :  "  O  tarry  thou  the  Lord's  leisure," 
"  Be  strong ;  let  thine  heart  take  courage ;  yea,  wait  thou  for  the 
Lord^.i 

vii.  Service. 

Some  who  think  themselves  of  a  practical  turn  of  mind 
say,  "  The  great  thing  is  work :  prayer  is  good,  and  right, 
but  the  great  need  is  to  be  doing  something  practical".  The 
truth  is  that  when  a  man  understands  about  prayer,  and  puts 
prayer  in  its  right  place  in  his  life,  he  finds  a  new  motive  power 
burning  in  his  bones  to  be  doing  ;  and,  further,  he  finds  that  it 
is  the  doing  which  grows  out  of  praying  that  is  mightiest  in 
touching  human  hearts.  And  he  finds  further,  yet  with  a  great 
joy,  that  he  may  be  doing  something  for  an  entire  world.  His 
service  becomes  as  broad  as  his  Master's  thought. 

IF  There  is  a  legend  of  a  monk  to  whom  in  his  chamber  the  Lord 
vouchsafed  to  appear  in  a  vision.  The  vision  of  Christ  brought 
great  peace  and  joy  to  his  heart.  Scarcely  had  he  been  thus 
favoured  for  a  few  moments,  when  the  bell  was  heard  which 
summoned  him  to  the  duty  of  distributing  loaves  of  bread  to  the 
poor.  For  a  moment  he  hesitated;  but  he  went  to  his  work. 
Oh,  what  a  sacrifice  to  leave  this  glorious  vision  for  the  dull 
routine  of  duty !  But  when  he  returned  to  his  cell,  what  was 
his  surprise  and  joy  to  find  the  vision  of  the  Lord  as  before.^ 

1.  The  close  relation  between  prayer  and  service  discovers 
two  principles :  the  vanity  of  prayerless  service,  and  the  futility 
and  mistake  of  merely  selfish  prayer.  Consider  the  first  principle. 
It  is  the  constant  temptation  of  human  pride  to  think  we  can 

1 1.  Abrahams,  in  Jewish  Addresses,  164. 
^Adolph  Saphir,  The  Hidden  Life,  214. 


MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER  213 

dispense  with  dependence  upon  God.  Prayer  is  the  corrective  of 
fatalism  on  the  one  hand  and  of  self-suflSciency  on  the  other. 
Here  we  are  concerned  with  the  peril  of  self-sufficiency.  It  is 
the  constant  lesson  of  the  Bible  and  Church  History  that  such 
pride  goeth  before  a  fall.  The  collective  interests  which  we  re- 
present and  which  we  are  called  to  champion  as  the  Church  of 
Christ,  demand  of  us  constant  exercise  in  prayer.  The  method 
of  progress  in  the  Kingdom  of  God  is  by  a  growing  life,  and  for 
the  creation  and  sustaining  of  that  life  in  all  its  activity  prayer 
is  absolutely  essential.     It  is  our  vital  breath. 

"  Laborare  est  orare,"  says  the  ancient  adage.  But  "  to 
labour  "  is  not  "  to  pray  " — not  of  necessity.  For  much  work  may 
be  done,  and  done  nobly  and  from  pure  motives,  in  the  service  of 
God  and  of  men,  though  there  may  be  no  thought  or  consciousness 
of  God  at  all  in  the  mind  of  the  man  who  does  it.  He  is  absorbed 
in  his  work.  He  is  maturing  his  plans.  He  is  watching  the  issue 
of  his  experiments.  He  is  wholly  intent  on  that  which  is  passing 
beneath  his  eyes.  And  this  is  good,  and  may  often  be  essential  to 
success,  but  it  is  not  what  we  mean  by  prayer.  Until  the  soul  of 
the  man  is  uplifted  towards  God,  he  has  not  begun  to  pray.  The 
distinction  must  be  preserved  between  saying  and  doing.  Saying 
— that  is,  the  speech  of  the  soul,  whether  the  lips  move  or  not — 
is  prayer.  Doing  is  not  prayer,  unless,  indeed,  the  thing  done  be 
done  explicitly  and  consciously,  as  a  sign  of  love  or  an  act  of 
praise,  or  is  regarded  by  the  man  who  does  it  as  the  distinct  and 
deliberate  expression  of  some  other  feeling  which  he  has  towards 
God.  Prayer  does  not  necessarily  involve  anything  more  than 
the  direct,  conscious  uplifting  of  the  soul  towards  God,  but  it 
always  does  involve  that. 

IF  The  monks  of  old  were  too  often  content  with  prayer  unac- 
companied by  any  practical  effort,  and  ended  by  leading  idle, 
useless  lives,  in  which  prayer  was  a  mere  form.  Now,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  servants  of  Christ  are  tempted  to  labour  only, 
and  neglect  to  give  sufficient  time  to  prayer;  yet,  if  they  do, 
their  work  is  bound  to  suffer.  In  the  words  of  the  Bishop  of 
Liverpool :  By  an  error  of  judgment,  or  perhaps  by  the  subtle 
force  of  inclination,  which  we  mistake  for  necessity,  we  work 
when  we  ought  to  pray,  because  to  an  active  mind  work  is  far 
easier  than  prayer.  Then  God  cannot  bless  us,  because  we  have 
weakened  our  capacity  to  receive.     We  grow  feeble  and  shallow 


214     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

and  distracted.  Our  work  is  done  superficially,  and  will  not 
stand ;  the  ring  goes  out  of  our  message,  and  our  life  loses  its 
power.  The  servant  whom  the  Holy  Spirit  is  to  use  must  resist 
the  tyranny  of  overwork.  He  must  resolve  to  be  alone  with 
God,  even  if  he  appear  to  rob  his  fellow-men  of  his  services.  It 
is  said  of  that  mighty  spirit  of  the  middle  ages,  St.  Bernard  of 
Clairvaux,  that  he  found  on  the  days  when  he  spent  most  time 
in  prayer  and  in  study  of  the  Bible  his  letters  were  most  rapidly 
written  and  most  persuasive,  and  his  own  schemes  were  widened 
or  lost  in  the  greater  purpose  of  God  ;  anxiety  was  allayed,  and 
the  power  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  to  which  he  had  opened  his  heart, 
was  felt  in  every  word  he  spake,  and  in  his  very  presence  and 
look.  Prayer  is  indeed  work;  and  there  are  times  when  it  is 
the  only  work  in  which  men  should  engage.  For  it  is  calling  on 
God  to  put  forth  His  mighty  power,  and  to  use  us  as  willing  and 
efficient  instruments  in  His  hands.  ^ 

IF  Westcott  read  and  worked  in  the  very  mind  with  which  he 
prayed ;  and  his  prayer  was  of  singular  intensity.  It  might  be 
only  the  elements  of  textual  criticism  with  which  he  was  dealing ; 
but  still  'it  was  all  steeped  in  the  atmosphere  of  awe,  and  devo- 
tion, and  mystery,  and  consecration.  He  taught  us  as  one  who 
ministered  at  an  Altar ;  and  the  details  of  the  Sacred  Text  were, 
to  him,  as  the  Ritual  of  some  Sacramental  action.^ 

IT  To  very  many  families,  Dr.  Harry  Rainy  was  indeed  "  the 
beloved  physician,"  and  to  this  day  there  are  in  Glasgow  persons, 
now  aged,  who  recall  his  kindness  to  them  during  some  illness  of 
their  youth  with  the  warmest  gratitude.  Every  patient  under 
his  hands  was  a  subject  of  his  prayers — a  fact  which  was  revealed 
only  towards  the  very  end  of  his  life,  when  he  mentioned  it 
in  counselling  a  young  doctor  "  never  to  spare  either  pains  or 
prayers  over  his  cases  ".^ 

2.  The  second  principle  brought  out  by  the  relation  between 
prayer  and  service  is  the  futility  and  mistake  of  selfish  prayer. 
To  preserve  the  balance  and  sanity  of  our  thought  of  prayer  in 
relation  to  service,  we  must  remember  that  purposeless  prayer 
is  vain.  If  service  has  its  dangers  of  lacking  the  salt  and  strength 
of  devoutness,  it  is  equally  true  that  prayer  needs  the  constant 
savour  of  service.  If  prayer  is  not  to  degenerate  into  morbid 
sentimentality,  it  must  be  freed  from  selfishness  and  self-satis- 

1 W.  H.  Dundas,  in  The  Churchman,  Jan.  1906,  p.  32. 

'Henry  Scott  Holland,  Personal  Studies,  130.         i 

8  P.  Carnegie  Simpgon,  The  Life  of  Principal  Bainy,  i.  22, 


MINOR  AIDS  TO  PRAYER  215 

faction.  The  central  aspiration  of  all  prayer  has  been  recognized 
in  this :  '*  Thy  kingdom  come.  Thy  will  be  done  ".  The  active 
and  the  passive  both  find  place.  All  the  requests  we  ever  utter 
for  daily  bread  or  forgiveness  have  in  this  their  ultimate  sanction 
or  plea.  This  is  praying  in  the  name  of  Christ,  praying  in  the 
Spirit.  Religious  selfishness  seeketh  its  own,  covets  pious 
rapture  or  glowing  vision  for  its  own  sake.  Consequently  its 
moods  may  have  the  luxuriance  of  a  jungle  or  a  fetid  swamp. 
The  River  of  God  carries  life  whithersoever  it  goeth.  The  prayer 
which  ends  in  "  God  bless  me  and  mine  "  is  after  all  akin  to  the 
spirit  of  the  man  who  had  much  goods  laid  up  for  many  years. 
The  daintiness  and  nausea  of  religious  appetite  arise  from  such 
cramped  and  circumscribed  desires,  or  from  unfaithfulness  to  the 
behests  of  prayer.  If  prayerless  service  has  its  perils,  serviceless 
prayer  has  them  no  less. 

IF  It  is  said  that  the  Lamas  of  Tibet  scatter  paper  horses  in 
the  air  with  the  idea  that  they  may  be  transformed  to  Arab  steeds. 
Prayer  is  not  such  futile  and  silly  expressions  of  desire.  It  is 
the  incorporation  of  ourselves  with  wider  interests.  It  is  the 
identification  of  ourselves  with  others'  sorrows,  and  our  own 
sorrows  with  theirs,  the  creation  through  all  our  lives  of  wider 
social  sympathy  and  striving.  All  is  made  to  minister  to  increased 
fitness  to  the  noblest  ends  of  life.  Even  self -development  is  not 
complete  as  an  end.  In  the  goal  of  our  becoming  what  God  wills 
is  enshrined  the  possibility  and  desire  of  doing  His  will.  "  Father, 
glorify  thy  name  "  is  the  constant  refrain  both  of  enduring  and 
of  endeavour. 

Esteeming  sorrow  whose  employ 
Is  to  develop,  not  destroy. 
Far  better  than  a  barren  joy, 

we  rejoice  even  in  tribulation.  Prayer  is  the  school  of  the  heart 
in  this  braver  view  of  life's  discipline.  It  is  the  act  of  faith 
whereby  that  optimism  in  the  interpretation  of  life  is  maintained. 
Tennyson  has  well  expressed  the  spirit  of  such  prayer : — 

Steel  me  with  patience !  soften  me  with  grief ! 
Let  blow  the  trumpet  strongly  while  I  pray. 
Till  this  embattled  wall  of  unbelief, 
My  prison,  not  my  fortress,  fall  away  ! 
Then,  if  Thou  wiliest,  let  my  day,  be  brief, 
So  Thou  wilt  strike  Thy  glory  thro'  the  day.^ 

1  A.  E.  Balob,  Prayer,  89. 


2i6     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  Some  commented  upon  the  Cunard  Company's  "  wonderful 
run  of  luck".  Others  talked  about  a  "special  interposition  of 
Providence "  on  behalf  of  the  Cunarders.  Indeed,  there  was  a 
story  current  that  the  sailing  of  every  ship  of  the  Cunard  fleet 
was  made  the  subject  of  special  prayer,  and  that  Mr.  Bums 
was  wont  to  attribute  his  success  to  this  source.  Mr.  Burns, 
however,  would  never  recognize  this  as  the  true  interpretation 
of  the  position.  He  held  that  there  were  certain  elements  that 
made  for  the  safety  of  a  vessel,  and  that  these  elements  were 
within  human  control.  He  was  scrupulously  careful  in  providing 
his  ships  with  all  these  features  even  if  he  sacrificed  speed,  risked 
his  profits,  and  invited  public  censure  by  doing  so.  *T  believe 
implicitly,"  he  would  say,  *'  in  the  power  of  prayer ;  but  I  also 
believe  in  doing  work  well,  and  in  subordinating  profit,  and 
speed,  and  public  opinion  to  safety,  comfort,  and  efficiency."  ^ 

How  infinite  and  sweet,  Thou  everywhere 
And  all-abounding  Love,  Thy  service  is ! 
Thou  liest  an  ocean  round  my  world  of  care. 
My  petty  every-day ;  and  fresh  and  fair 
Pour  Thy  strong  tides  through  all  my  crevices, 
Until  the  silence  ripples  into  prayer. 

That  Thy  full  glory  may  abound,  increase. 
And  so  Thy  likeness  shall  be  formed  in  me, 
I  pray ;  the  answer  is  not  rest  or  peace, 
But  charges,  duties,  wants,  anxieties. 
Till  there  seems  room  for  everything  but  Thee, 
And  never  time  for  anything  but  these. 

And  I  should  fear,  but  lo  !  amid  the  press. 
The  whirl  and  hum  and  pressure  of  my  day, 
I  hear  Thy  garment's  sweep.  Thy  seamless  dress, 
And  close  beside  my  work  and  weariness 
Discern  Thy  gracious  form,  not  far  away, 
But  very  near,  O  Lord,  to  help  and  bless. 

The  busy  fingers  fly,  the  eyes  may  see 

Only  the  glancing  needle  which  they  hold. 

But  all  my  life  is  blossoming  inwardly, 

And  every  breath  is  like  a  litany, 

While  through  each  labour,  like  a  thread  of  gold. 

Is  woven  the  sweet  consciousness  of  Thee !  2 

*  F.  W.  Boreham,  Mountains  in  the  Mist,  247.  »  S.  C.  Woolsey. 


XI. 

Scientific  Objections  to  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Abbott,  E.  A.,  Cambridge  Sermons  (1875). 

Bergson,  H.,  Creative  Evolution  (1912). 

Biederwolf,  W.  E.,  How  Can  God  Answer  Prayer  ?  (1913). 

Bowne,  B.  P.,  The  Essence  of  Religion  (1911). 

Brierley,  J.,  Life  and  the  Ideal  (1910). 

Brown,  C.  R.,  The  Main  Points  in  Christian  Belief  (1911). 

Campbell,  R.  J.,  ^  Faith  for  To-Day  (1900). 

Drummond,  H.,  Natural  Law  in  the  Spiritual  World  (1883). 

Greenwell,  Dora,  Essays  (1867). 

How,  W.  W.,  The  Knowledge  of  God  (1892). 

James,  J.  G.,  The  Prayer  Life. 

Jellett,  J.  H.,  The  Efficacy  of  Prayer  (1879). 

John,  Griffith,  A  Voice  from  China  (1907). 

Jowett,  B.,  Sermons  on  Faith  and  Doctrine  (1901). 

Liddon,  H.  P.,  Some  Elemeyits  of  Religion  (1873). 

McComb,  S.,  Christianity  and  the  Modern  Mind  (1910). 

Magee,  W.  C,  Christ  the  Light  of  All  Scripture  (1892). 

Robinson,  A.  W.,  in  Cambridge  Theological  Essays  (1905). 

Swetenham,  L.,  Conquering  Prayer  (1908). 

Waggett,  P.  N.,  The  Scientific  Temper  in  Religion  (1905). 

Ward,  W.,  William  George  Ward,  and  the  Catholic  Revival  (1912). 

Welldon,  J.  E.  C,  The  School  of  Faith  (1904). 

Expositor,  Ist  Ser.,  v.  (1879)  406  (S.  Cox). 

Preacher's  Magazine,  xxv.  (1914)  164  (A.  L.  Humphries). 


2l8 


Scientific  Objections  to  Prayer. 

There  are  very  real  and  special  difficulties  connected  with  the 
act  of  prayer.  It  would  be  strange  if  there  were  not  when  the 
mystery  of  man  meets  the  mystery  of  God.  It  would  be  strange 
if  there  were  no  difficulties  attending  the  speech  of  man  to  God. 
There  are  intellectual  difficulties  attending  the  act,  and  there  are 
difficulties  inherent  in  the  act,  that  rise  to  the  very  surface  of  a 
man's  mind  when  he  thinks  intellectually  at  all  of  prayer. 

If  Have  you  observed  that  the  scientific  difficulty  has  no  place 
in  the  teachings  of  Jesus  Christ  ?  He  does  not  refer  to  it  even. 
Indeed,  it  is  impossible  to  conceive  how  He  could  have  referred 
to  it.  To  His  mind  there  could  be  no  difficulty  on  the  Divine 
side.  The  Father,  to  His  vision,  is  Lord  of  heaven  and  earth. 
Nature  and  nature's  laws  are  under  His  sway.  There  is  nothing 
impossible  to  Him.  Our  Lord  does  speak  of  difficulties  in  con- 
nexion with  prayer,  and  very  serious  difficulties ;  but  the  scientific 
difficulty  is  not  among  them.  The  difficulties  of  which  He  speaks 
are  on  man's  side.  He  speaks  of  the  want  of  faith  as  a  difficulty, 
of  the  want  of  perseverance  as  a  difficulty,  of  the  want  of  union 
with  Himself  as  a  difficulty.  According  to  His  teachings,  it  is 
the  absence  of  these  that  causes  prayer  to  remain  unanswered, 
never  by  reason  of  science  which  makes  it  impossible.^ 

1.  First  of  all,  we  must  see  distinctly  what  we  mean  by 
prayer.  We  do  not  mean  merely  the  act  of  adoration,  of  ad- 
miration, of  praise ;  we  mean  also  the  act  of  petition,  of  asking 
our  Father  in  Heaven  to  give  us  something,  and  believing  that 
He  will,  if  He  thinks  fit,  give  us  the  thing  we  ask  for.  That  is 
the  real  test  of  prayer ;  that,  and  that  only,  is  the  real  difficulty. 
There  is  no  difficulty  in  believing  that  the  act  of  prayer  may 
have  some  reflex  benefit  to  the  soul  of  the  person  who  prays ;  to 
say,  for  instance,  that  though  we  cannot  get  what  we  ask,  we 
may  indirectly  get  good  dispositions  by  asking  for  what  we  know 
we  cannot  have,  presents  no  intellectual  difficulty  whatever ;  the 

^  Gvif^ih  John,  A  Voice  from  Chma,  ISO. 
2x9 


220    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

only  diflScuIty  in  that  case  is  to  imagine  the  possibility  of  anyone 
praying  under  such  conditions. 

2.  Two  objections  to  prayer  on  intellectual  grounds  are  made 
— one  from  a  scientific  and  the  other  from  a  philosophical  point 
of  view. 

(1)  The  claim  is  made  that  an  answer  to  prayer  would  involve 
the  interruption  of  the  established  order  ;  it  would  mean,  there- 
fore, a  violation  of  law.  In  the  presence  of  the  unbending  con- 
stancy of  the  physical  system  which  surrounds  us,  impressing  the 
average  man  with  its  moral  indifference,  prayer  seems  like  an 
irrational  proceeding.  It  appears  to  some  minds  as  the  act  of  a 
puny  being  urging  upon  the  Omnipotent  that  the  great  through 
traffic  of  the  world  be  side-tracked  in  order  to  give  his  local  train 
the  right  of  way. 

(2)  The  other  objection  is  to  the  effect  that  if  God  is  wise 
and  good,  He  will  do  what  is  best  for  us,  and  for  every  one, 
without  our  asking — indeed,  to  ask  Him  for  anything  implies  a 
certain  solicitude  as  to  His  appropriate  action.  "  Your  heavenly 
Father  knoweth  that  ye  have  need  of  all  these  things."  Then 
why  should  we  ask  ?  It  is  an  impertinence  in  that  it  calls  upon 
Him  to  change  His  line  of  action  in  obedience  to  our  suggestion. 
All  the  lesser  questions  which  arise  are  really  comprehended 
within  these  two  fundamental  ones. 

In  the  present  chapter  we  shall  deal  with  the  first  of  these 
objections  to  prayer,  the  objection  that  arises  from  the  idea  of  the 
uniformity  of  nature.  Let  us  see  (1)  whether  physical  and 
spiritual  things  may  be  separated,  so  that  even  if  we  may  no 
longer  pray  for  the  former  we  may  still  pray  for  the  latter ; 
(2)  what  is  to  be  understood  by  "  law  "  as  applied  to  nature,  and 
whether  it  can  properly  be  said  to  be  immutable ;  (3)  how  the 
matter  stands  when  we  regard  the  laws  of  nature  as  the  outcome 
of  a  personal  mind. 

I. 

The  Physical  and  the  Spiritual. 

The  great  modern  argument  from  physical  science  against 
prayer  is  this  :   We  everywhere  find  the  reign  of  law,  i.e.  God,  if 


SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER    221 

there  be  a  God,  rules  the  universe  and  the  affairs  of  men  in  certain 
fixed  and  invariable  modes :  how  then  can  we  hope,  or  wish,  that 
He  should  violate  these  laws,  which  ensure  the  general  welfare, 
in  order  to  show  special  favour  to  this  man  or  that,  to  supply 
his  want,  or  to  gratify  his  desire  ?  Time  was  when  it  was 
pardonable  that  men  should  pray  for  rain  or  for  fair  weather,  for 
health  or  abundant  harvests  ;  but  it  is  no  longer  rational  of  them, 
now  that  the  scientific  idea  of  law  has  been  proclaimed.  We 
know  that  rain  is  the  product  of  atmospheric  laws  which,  under 
certain  conditions,  render  it  inevitable.  We  know  that  health 
or  disease  is  the  result  of  physiological  laws,  which  absolutely 
determine  that  one  man  shall  live  and  another  die.  The  idea 
that  rain  and  death  are  dependent  on  the  will  of  a  Being  who 
can  avert  or  precipitate  them  at  His  pleasure  is  therefore  utterly 
unscientific  and  irrational ;  it  belongs  to  the  days  when  broad 
margins  of  human  life  and  thought  lay  in  a  gross  darkness, 
peopled  by  the  popular  imagination  with  the  caprices  of  an  omni- 
potent Will ;  just  as  in  the  ancient  maps  large  unknown  tracts 
of  the  earth  were  depicted  as  the  haunts  of  chimeras  dire  and 
monstrous  forms  of  life.  But  now,  darkness  has  given  place  to 
light,  the  monstrous  to  the  natural,  caprice  to  law,  confusion  to 
order ;  and  we  can  no  longer  believe  that,  by  our  prayers,  we 
change  that  perfect  Will  which  works  out  the  welfare  of  the 
universe  by  methods  as  fixed  and  invariable  as  itself. 

IF  That  nature  is  governed  by  fixed  laws ;  that  effects  flow 
from  causes,  that  the  order  of  the  Divine  work  is  visible,  not 
only,  as  the  ancients  might  have  supposed,  in  the  movements  of 
the  heavenly  bodies,  but  also  in  the  least  things  and  the  things 
which  appear  to  be  the  most  capricious  ("  even  the  very  hairs  of 
your  head  are  all  numbered") — this  is  a  very  great  lesson  which 
is  being  taught  us  daily  and  hourly  by  the  commonest  observa- 
tion, as  well  as  by  the  latest  results  of  science.  Everywhere,  as 
far  as  we  can  see  or  observe  or  decompose  the  world  around  us, 
the  pressure  of  law  is  discernible.  And  even  if  there  are  some 
things  which  we  cannot  see,  which  are  too  subtle  to  be  reached 
by  the  eye  of  man  or  the  use  of  instruments,  still  we  are  right  in 
supposing  that  the  empire  of  law  does  not  cease  with  them,  but 
that,  in  the  invisible  corners  of  nature,  as  they  may  be  termed, 
the  same  powers  rule,  giving  order  and  arrangement  to  the  least 
things  as  well  as  the  greatest.^ 

1  Benjamin  Jowett,  Sermons  on  Faith  and  Doctrine,  267. 


222     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

1.  The  three  men  in  the  nineteenth  century  who  have  written 
most  profoundly  upon  the  subject  of  prayer — Schleiermacher, 
F.  W.  Robertson,  and  Martineau — were  never  able  to  overcome 
absolutely  the  scientific  hindrance  to  an  adequate  treatment  of 
their  theme.  They  divided  the  world  of  reality  into  two  great 
departments  or  realms — the  realm  of  external,  physical  nature, 
in  which  inviolable  necessity  rules,  and  the  realm  of  the  soul,  the 
home  of  freedom  and  spontaneity.  As  Martineau  puts  it :  "  The 
physical  is  governed  from  without ;  the  spiritual  can  govern 
itself.  The  former  is  subject  to  the  same  fixed  laws  that  prevail 
in  other  parts  of  the  organized  world.  The  latter  is  a  centre  of 
individual  power  which  issues  its  own  determinations.  No  act 
of  will  can  protect  the  body  amidst  present  pestilence,  but  holy 
resolution  will  fortify  the  soul  against  temptation." 

The  assumption  is  that  spiritual  forces  and  mind  constitute 
one  realm,  and  mechanical  forces  and  matter  another,  the  deduc- 
tion being  that  prayer,  as  belonging  to  the  former  sphere,  is 
altogether  out  of  touch  with  the  domain  of  physical  causation. 
But  does  the  division  thus  postulated  really  exist  ?  The  hand,  as 
it  writes,  is  performing  certain  physical  movements,  but  they  are 
the  consequent  of  a  spiritual  antecedent,  and  the  hand  is  but 
serving  as  the  instrument  of  the  mind.  Indeed,  the  connexion 
there  is  so  immediate  to  consciousness,  and  the  subservience  of 
matter  to  mind  so  direct  and  instantaneous,  that  from  it  there 
has  been  derived  the  very  notion  of  cause  which  science  applies 
with  such  fruitfulness  in  its  explanation  of  natural  phenomena. 

IT  Of  all  the  idle  distinctions  that  ever  have  been  drawn  in 
any  controversy,  the  idlest  of  all  is  this  which  tells  us  we  may 
ask  for  things  spiritual  because  they  may  and  can  be  given,  but 
we  must  not  ask  for  things  in  the  natural  world  because  they 
cannot  be  given ;  that  we  may  pray  for  good  dispositions,  but 
that  it  is  a  folly  to  ask  for  good  weather ;  that  God  may  interfere 
in  the  one  but  not  in  the  other.  Surely  this  is  utterly  illogical ; 
surely  if  there  be  law  anywhere  there  is  law  everywhere.^ 

2.  The  exclusion  of  the  operation  of  prayer  from  the  physical 
world  is  based  on  the  idea  that,  in  asking  God  to  grant  us  a 
physical  benefit,  we  ask  Him  to  perform  a  miracle.  But  this  is 
equally  true  if  the  benefit  asked  for  be  spiritual.     There,  as  here, 

1  Archbishop  W.  C.  Magee,  Christ  the  Light  of  all  Scripture,  196. 


SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER    223 

we  ask  for  the  exertion  of  a  power  transcending,  not  only  in 
degree  but  in  kind,  the  power  of  man.  There,  as  here,  we  ask  for 
an  action  possessing  the  distinctive  character  of  a  miracle,  namely, 
a  volition  followed  by  an  immediate  external  result.  The  truth 
is,  that  to  ask  God  to  act  at  all  and  to  ask  Him  to  perform  a 
miracle  are  one  and  the  same  thing.  Every  real  answer  to  prayer 
is  miraculous.  Every  such  answer  disturbs  the  normal  operation 
of  existing  laws,  whether  by  procuring  the  intervention  of  a  higher 
law,  or  otherwise.  Or,  to  speak  more  accurately,  every  such  answer 
involves  a  certain  departure  from  what,  as  we  presume,  would  other- 
wise have  been  God's  mode  of  working,  who  works  everywhere  in 
the  physical  as  in  the  moral  world.  The  difference  between  a  resur- 
rection from  the  dead  at  a  prophet's  prayer  and  the  increase  of 
clear-sightedness  or  of  love  through  an  infusion  of  grace  in  the  soul 
of  a  cottager  is  a  difference  of  degree.  It  is  not  a  difference  of 
kind.  Each  result  is  the  product  of  a  Divine  interference  with  the 
normal  course  of  things.  And  if  this  is  the  case,  the  distinction 
between  what  we  think  great  and  striking  answers  to  prayer, 
because  they  impress  our  human  imaginations  so  powerfully,  and 
ordinary  answers  does  not  exist  for  Him  to  whose  intelligence 
the  least  among  created  things  are  as  the  greatest,  before  whom 
all  that  He  has  made  is  in  the  aggregate  so  infinitely  little. 

IT  I  noticed  a  lengthy  discussion  in  the  newspapers  a  month  or 
two  ago,  on  the  propriety  of  praying  for  or  against  rain.  It  had 
suddenly,  it  seems,  occurred  to  the  public  mind,  and  to  that  of 
the  gentlemen  who  write  the  theology  of  the  breakfast  table, 
that  rain  was  owing  to  natural  causes ;  and  that  it  must  be  un- 
reasonable to  expect  God  to  supply  on  our  immediate  demand 
what  could  not  be  provided  but  by  previous  evaporation.  I 
noticed  further  that  this  alarming  difficulty  was  at  least  softened 
to  some  of  our  Metropolitan  congregations  by  the  assurances  of 
their  ministers  that,  although,  since  the  last  lecture  by  Professor 
Tyndall  at  the  Royal  Institution,  it  had  become  impossible  to 
think  of  asking  God  for  any  temporal  blessing,  they  might  still 
hope  their  applications  for  spiritual  advantages  would  occasionally 
be  successful — thus  implying  that  though  material  processes  were 
necessarily  slow,  and  the  laws  of  Heaven  respecting  matter 
inviolable,  mental  processes  might  be  instantaneous,  and  mental 
laws  at  any  moment  disregarded  by  their  Institutor :  so  that  the 
spirit  of  a  man  might  be  brought  to  maturity  in  a  moment, 
though  the  resources  of  Omnipotence  would  be  overtaxed,  or  its 


224     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

consistency  abandoned,  in  the  endeavour  to  produce  the  same 
result  on  a  greengage. i 

IT  The  position  we  have  been  led  to  take  up  is  not  that  the 
Spiritual  Laws  are  analogous  to  the  Natural  Laws,  but  that  they 
are  the  same  Laws.  It  is  not  a  question  of  analogy  but  of 
Identity.  The  Natural  Laws  are  not  the  shadows  or  images  of 
the  Spiritual  in  the  same  sense  as  autumn  is  emblematical  of 
Decay,  or  the  falling  leaf  of  Death.  The  Natural  Laws,  as  the 
Law  of  Continuity  might  well  warn  us,  do  not  stop  with  the 
visible  and  then  give  place  to  a  new  set  of  Laws  bearing  a  strong 
similitude  to  them.  The  Laws  of  the  invisible  are  the  same  Laws, 
proj  ections  of  the  natural  not  supernatural.  Analogous  Phenomena 
are  not  the  fruit  of  parallel  Laws,  but  of  the  same  Laws — Laws 
which  at  one  end,  as  it  were,  may  be  dealing  with  Matter,  at  the 
other  end  with  Spirit.^ 


n. 

The  Meaning  of  Law. 

But  now  let  us  understand  what  is  meant  by  a  law  of  nature. 
Naturally,  and  indeed  unavoidably,  we  employ  such  terms  as 
order,  constitution,  arrangement,  when  we  attempt  to  describe 
the  world,  the  cosmos,  the  universe.  And  when  we  are  pressed 
to  explain  what  is  implied  in  these  terms  we  fall  back  upon  a 
single  term — Law.  Law  is  the  underlying  and  unifying  principle. 
It  is  by  conformity  with  law  that  a  settled  order  is  rendered 
possible. 

1.  Taken  in  the  strictest  sense  of  the  word,  the  principle  of 
law  is  this — that  the  same  system  of  antecedents  'will  always, 
and  everywhere,  be  followed  by  the  same  consequent.  Expressed 
in  more  popular  language,  it  declares  that  the  same  cause  is 
always  and  everywhere  followed  by  the  same  effect.  The  change 
of  time  or  place,  if  it  leave  the  antecedents  unchanged,  leaves  the 
consequent  unchanged  also.  This  is  the  principle  of  law  in  its 
strictest  sense. 

A  law  of  nature,  then,  is  an  assertion  that,  as  far  as  experience 

iRuskin,  The  Nature  and  Authcyriiy  of  Miracle  {Works,  xxxiv.  115). 
2  H.  Drummond,  Natural  Law  in  the  Spiritual  World. 


SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER    225 

goes,  certain  facts  always  have  followed  certain  other  facts,  and 
that  our  experience  is  so  great  as  to  justify  us  in  inferring  that 
the  sequence  will  always  continue.     To  the  facts  that  have  in- 
variably preceded  we  give  the  name  of  causes ;  to  those  that  have 
invariably  followed  we  give  the  name  of  effects.     We  sometimes 
talk  loosely,  as  though  one  set  of   facts  explained  or  created 
another.     Finding  also  that  this  invariable  sequence  is  apparently, 
in  many  cases,  not  to  be  disturbed  by  human  efforts,  and  that,  in 
such  cases,  when  it  comes  into  collision  with  human  will,  it  con- 
strains obedience,  we  give  to  this  sequence  the  name  of  Necessity. 
The  name  is  but  a  name.     It  merely  represents  a  personification 
of  the  unpleasing  side  of  invariability.     Nor  can  we  strictly  say 
that  causes  produce  or  explain  effects.     What  we  call  the  causes 
teach  us  when  to  expect  and  how  to  bring  about  what  we  call  the 
effects ;  but  there  is  no  creation  or  explanation.     A  stone  unsup- 
ported in  the  air  falls  to  the  ground  :  explain  that.     Why  does  it 
fall  ?     It  may  be  replied  that  its  fall  is  explained  by  the  law  of 
gravitation,  which  asserts  that  every  particle  of  matter  attracts 
every  other  particle.     But  what  is  this  law  of  gravitation  except 
a  reassertion  of  the  original  fact,  viz.,  that  the  stone  moves  to  the 
earth,  including,  besides,  an  assertion  of  many  other  similar  facts 
which  have  led  us  to  leap  beyond  our  facts  to  a  general  assertion 
of  invariability  ?     For  all  purposes  of  explaining  the  stone's  fall, 
to  talk  about  the  law  of  gravitation  is  as  useless  as  it  would  be 
to  try  to  explain  the  death  of  a  man  by  saying  that  all  animate 
beings  are  mortal.     We  cannot  fully  explain,  in  the  strictest  sense 
of  the  word,  any  part  of  any  process  in  the  universe.     All  that 
we  can  do  is,  when  we  find  an  unusually  vast  gap  between  effect 
and  cause,  to  fill  up  the  gap  by  bringing  to  light  unnoticed  links 
of  phenomena,  themselves  both  effects  and  causes ;  thus  we  com- 
plete the  chain  to  our  satisfaction  by  assimilating  the  sequence  of 
cause  and  effect  to  those  ordinary  sequences  of  nature  which  we 
call  natural  because  we  are  accustomed  to  them.     And  when  we 
have  done  all  we  can,  we  can  say  no  more  than  this,  that  the 
sequence  now  resembles  our  ordinary  experience  of  sequences. 
But  as  for  the  ultimate  cause  or  creating  source  of  any  action, 
that  gap  has  never  yet  been  filled  up,  nor  has  any  explanation 
been  given  of  it.     The  sceptic  must  fall  back  upon  the  unknown 
and  unknowable ;  the  Atheist  must  say,  "  It  is,  because  it  is  " ;  the 

15 


226     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

theist,  "It  is,  because  God  wills  ".  Upon  the  will  of  God,  then, 
we  must  say,  if  we  believe  in  a  God,  depends  every  part  of  every 
invariable  process  in  the  universe. 

2.  Accordingly,  when  we  speak  of  a  law  of  nature  the  ques- 
tion is  :  Are  we  thinking  of  some  self-sustained  invisible  force,  of 
which  we  can  give  no  account  except  that  here  it  is  a  matter  of 
experience  ?  Or  do  we  mean  by  a  law  of  nature  only  a  principle 
which,  as  our  observation  shows  us,  appears  to  govern  particular 
actions  of  the  Almighty  Agent  who  made  and  who  upholds  the 
universe  ?  If  the  former,  let  us  frankly  admit  that  we  have  not 
merely  fettered  God's  freedom  ;  we  have,  alas  !  ceased  to  believe 
in  Him.  For  such  self -sustained  force  is  either  self -originating, 
in  which  case  there  is  no  Being  in  existence  who  has  made  all 
that  constituted  this  universe ;  or  otherwise,  having  derived  its 
first  impact  from  the  creative  will  of  God,  this  force  has  subse- 
quently escaped  altogether  from  His  control,  so  that  it  now  fetters 
His  liberty  ;  and,  in  this  case,  there  is  no  Being  in  existence  who 
is  almighty,  in  the  sense  of  being  really  Master  of  this  universe. 
If,  however,  we  mean  by  law  the  observed  regularity  with  which 
God  works  in  nature  as  in  grace,  then  in  our  contact  with  law 
we  are  dealing,  not  with  a  brutal,  unintelligent,  unconquerable 
force,  but  with  the  free  will  of  an  intelligent  and  moral  Artist, 
who  works,  in  His  perfect  freedom,  with  sustained  and  beautiful 
symmetry.  Where  is  the  absurdity  of  asking  Him  to  hold  His 
hand,  or  to  hasten  His  work  ?  He  to  whom  we  pray  may  be 
trusted  to  grant  or  to  refuse  a  prayer,  as  may  seem  best  to  the 
highest  wisdom  and  the  truest  love.  And  if  He  grant  it,  He  is 
not  without  resources,  even  although  we  should  have  asked  Him 
to  suspend  what  we  call  a  natural  law.  Can  He  not  then  pro- 
vide for  the  freedom  of  His  action  without  violating  its  order  ? 
Can  He  not  supersede  a  lower  rule  of  working  by  the  interven- 
tion of  a  higher?  If  He  really  works  at  all ;  if  something  that 
is  neither  moral  nor  intelligent  has  not  usurped  His  throne,  it  is 
certain  that  "  the  thing  that  is  done  upon  earth  He  doeth  it  Him- 
self," and  that  it  is  therefore  as  consistent  with  reason  as  with 
reverence  to  treat  Him  as  being  a  free  Agent,  who  is  not  really 
tied  and  bound  by  the  intellectual  abstractions  with  which  finite 
intellects  would  fain  destroy  the  freedom  of  His  action. 


SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER    227 

IF  If  God  is  a  person,  and  we  cannot  think  of  Him  as  less,  it 
is  absurd  to  suppose  that  He  is  unaffected  or  uninfluenced  by  our 
petitions.  This  at  once  disposes  of  the  purely  subjective  doctrine 
of  prayer,  and  the  objection  raised  on  the  ground  of  a  fixed  and 
unalterable  order.  There  can  be  no  personal  relation  without 
reciprocal  action,  and  it  is  useless  to  argue  that  God  is  untouched 
or  unmoved  by  the  supplications  of  those  to  whom  He  is  related 
by  the  bonds  of  love  and  mutual  affection.  To  say  that  God 
can  only  act  in  harmony  with  His  own  law  and  in  accordance 
with  His  own  mode  of  action  is  to  deny  the  freedom  that  we 
ourselves  possess  to  the  great  Personality  of  which  we  are  the 
faint  and  imperfect  copies.  It  is  to  raise  abstract  law  and  order 
above  God  Himself,  and  to  place  Him  under  a  lower  category  of 
thought  than  His  own  being.  It  is  not  to  honour  God  to  think 
of  Him  as  working  His  will  through  all  obstacles,  regardless  of 
and  indifferent  to  the  disposition  and  the  co-operation  of  His 
creatures,  driven  by  resistless  laws,  and  incapable  of  intervention 
in  the  order  that  He  has  once  established.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  power  of  self -limitation  and  the  disposition  to  determine  His 
own  action  in  accord  with  the  choice  of  the  free  beings  that  He 
has  created  argues  for  the  greatness  of  the  love  that  stoops  to 
ask  for  loving  service  and  co-operation.^ 

3.  Does  the  introduction  of  God  violate  the  law  ?  It  is  no 
violation  of  the  principle  of  law  to  assert  that  the  introduction  of 
a  volition  into  one  of  two  identical  conditions  of  the  human  body 
determines  a  totally  different  result.  There  is  a  movement  in 
the  one  case ;  there  is  none  in  the  other ;  but  the  principle  of 
law  remains  inviolate.  So,  too,  it  is  no  violation  of  the  principle 
fOf  law  to  suppose  that  the  introduction  of  a  Divine  volition  into 
one  of  two  identical  systems  of  antecedents  should  determine  a 
wholly  different^onsec[uentj^  a^^  and  nothing  else,  that 

is  asserted  by  the  doctrine  of  the  efficacy  of  prayer.  It  is  not 
asserted  that,  as  a  resultof  prayer,  a  different  consequent  follows 
from  the  same  system  of  antecedents ;  but  it  is  asserted  that,  as 
a  result  of  prayer^  a  new  antecedent  appears,  and  that  thus  the 
consequent  is  changed.  Whether  this  is  really  so  is  another 
question,  but  it  certainly  may  be  so  without  any  violation  of  the 
principle  of  law. 

IT  If  we  see  in  the  responsible  agent  back  of  all  the  workings 
of  nature  God  Himself,  then  what  are  these  various  modes  of 

^  J.  G.  James,  TJie  Prayer  Life,  73, 


228     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

action  which  are  so  regular  and  so  immutable,  and  which  we  call 
Law,  but  expressions  of  God's  own  will  ?  Law  is  the  expression 
of  God's  will.  It  is  the  way  God  decides  that  force  shall  act 
upon  matter.  In  itself  it  has  no  existence ;  it  is  simply  our 
name  for  expressing  God's  mode  of  working.  It  is  the  way  God 
does  things.  The  only  thing  science  can  say  is,  certain  effects 
follow  certain  causes  because  they  do :  the  Christian  says  they 
do  because  God  provides  for  their  so  doing.  In  other  words, 
"  the  thing  that  is  done  upon  earth  he  doeth  it  himself  ".  Since 
this  is  true,  where  is  the  folly  of  asking  God  to  control  the 
forces  of  either  the  natural  or  spiritual  world  for  the  benefit  of 
His  trusting,  praying  children  ?  Surely  God  would  leave  room 
for  the  freedom  of  His  will  without  necessarily  violating  the 
order  He  established.  More  than  this,  who  will  dare  say  that 
God  cannot,  if  He  choose,  without  disaster,  modify,  suspend,  or 
even  change  what  we  call  a  law  ?  But  to  answer  prayer  no  such 
heroic  measures  are  necessary.  Every  result  which  even  man 
produces  is  brought  about  by  the  combination  and  adjustment  of 
forces  existent  about  him.  Science  has  proven  beyond  a  shadow 
of  doubt  that  every  force  in  the  world  is  wholly  inoperative 
unless  certain  conditions  are  fulfilled,  and  that  when  these  con- 
ditions are  fulfilled  that  force  begins  to  work  its  wonders.  Shall 
the  creature  be  privileged  thus  to  utilize  the  forces  which  he 
found  here  at  his  coming  and  the  like  prerogative  be  denied  the 
Creator  who  brought  them  into  existence  ?  Has  man  any  good 
reason  for  believing  that  his  will  is  more  closely  linked  with 
these  things  than  is  the  will  of  God  ?  ^ 

III. 

Mind  and  Will  in  Natural  Law. 

Nothing  enters  into  the  meaning  of  law  which  could  make  it 
in  the  least  degree  unnatural  to  regard  law  as  the  outcome  of 
mind  and  the  expression  of  personal  will.  Nay  more,  it  is  allowed 
that,  for  the  vast  majority  of  those  who  have  entertained  it,  the 
thought  of  law  has  carried  with  it,  avowedly  or  tacitly,  the 
thought  of  a  lawgiver.  Has  the  case  been  altered  by  any  modi- 
fication which  the  idea  of  law  has  undergone  through  the  influence 
of  modern  science  ?  It  is  often  popularly  supposed  that  it  has. 
This  has  been  largely  the  result  of  a  loose  and  unguarded  manner 
of  speaking.     We  very  commonly  hear  the  expressions  "  governed 

»  W.  E,  Biederwolf ,  How  Can  Qod  Answer  Prayer  ?  93. 


SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER    229 

by  law,"  and  "reign  of  law".  Such  expressions,  vivid  and 
picturesque  as  they  are,  cannot  be  defended  when  accurate  think- 
ing is  in  question.  They  may  become  seriously  misleading. 
Years  ago  Dr.  W.  B.  Carpenter  challenged  the  propriety  of  the 
first  of  them,  and  urged  that  what  was  intended  would  be  more 
satisfactorily  conveyed  by  saying,  "  governed  according  to  law  ". 
Law  is  not  an  entity  in  itself,  nor  is  it  a  force  which  we  have 
any  right  to  invest  with  the  attributes  of  personality.  It  is 
simply  a  principle  of  arrangement,  a  method  of  procedure. 
"  Law,"  said  Prof.  Huxley,  **  means  a  rule  which  we  have  always 
found  to  hold  good,  and  which  we  expect  always  will  hold  good." 
Law  of  itself  can  have  no  governing  power.  At  the  most  its 
existence  can  suggest,  or  imply,  a  personality  behind  it.  Law  is 
not  a  being ;  it  is  an  abstraction.  It  is  a  term  for  expressing 
the  uniformity  of  the  sequences  of  nature.  Law  is  another 
name  for  invariable  succession.  Fire,  brought  into  contact  with 
a  certain  class  of  material  things,  burns — not  once  or  twice,  but 
always.  The  conditions  being  the  same,  the  same  effect  follows. 
This,  we  say,  is  a  law.  But  Theism  holds  not  only  that  law  is  no 
agent,  but  that  agency,  so  far  as  it  belongs  to  objects  in  nature, 
is  dependent  upon,  and  either  immediately  or  ultimately  derived 
from,  the  Creator  and  Preserver  of  nature.  Law  signifies  His 
plan  of  acting,  or  the  plan  which  the  living  God  ordains  for  the 
action  of  the  forces  of  matter. 

IF  Observe  the  terms  on  which  our  inner  personality  lives  with 
what  we  call  the  inexorable  physical  laws.  While  recognizing 
them  at  every  point,  it  knows  itself  as  not  of  them,  as  more  than 
they.  They  are  the  rules  of  the  game,  but  they  do  not  play  the 
game.  It  is  we  who  do  that.  When  I  rise  to  cross  the  room, 
my  bones  and  muscles  will  obey  all  the  laws  of  motion.  But  it 
is  not  the  laws  of  motion  that  send  me  across  the  room ;  but  my 
thought  and  will  which  use  them,  but  are  not  they.  We  move 
freely  in  a  bound  universe.  That  is  the  miracle,  we  are  the 
miracle.  And  it  is  to  this  region  of  the  spirit,  of  personality, 
that  prayer  belongs.  It  supposes  a  kingdom  of  the  spiritual 
stretching  beyond  our  ken,  just  as  does  the  kingdom  of  the 
physical.  They  both  begin  here,  with  us,  and  both  stretch  be- 
yond us.  There  are  millions  of  freely-acting  spirits  on  this  earth, 
clothed  as  we  are  with  bodies.  Why  should  we  suppose  we 
exhaust  the  spirituality  of  the  universe  ?     It  is  an  inevitable 


230    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

inference  from  what  goes  on  around  us  that  behind  the  physical 
infinite  is  a  spiritual  infinite.^ 

1.  It  has  to  be  remembered  that  we  are  all  of  us  perpetually 
interfering — no  weaker  word  can  be  substituted — with  the  physi- 
cal order  about  us.  "  What  is  it,"  asks  Romanes,  "  that  most  dis- 
tinguishes human  intelligence  in  its  relation  to  Natural  Law  ? 
Most  assuredly  its  utilizing  abilit}^ — its  power  to  direct  the 
natural  forces  to  the  accomplishment  of  special  ends.  .  .  .  The 
mind  of  man,  considered  thus  as  a  natural  cause,  is  certainly  of 
all  single  natural  causes  the  most  influential ;  not,  of  course,  in 
respect  of  the  magnitude  of  its  effects,  but  in  respect  of  their 
number  and  diversity."  ^  Human  purpose  and  volition  are  per- 
petually playing  into  the  system  of  law,  thereby  realizing  a 
multitude  of  effects  which  the  system,  left  to  itself,  would  never 
produce,  yet  in  such  a  way  that  no  law  is  broken.  Natural  law 
of  itself  would  never  do  any  of  the  things  which  men  are  doing 
by  means  of  it.  The  work  of  the  world  is  done  by  natural 
forces  under  human  guidance.  It  is  the  outcome  at  once  of  law 
and  of  purpose. 

The  phenomena  of  will  are  no  less  real  than  those  of  chemistry 
or  mechanics,  and  we  are  no  less  bound  to  take  them  into  account, 
when  we  are  discussing  such  a  question  as  the  present.  But 
whatever  some  may  say,  few  things  are  more  certain  than  that 
the  phenomena  of  will — and  especially  the  moral  acts  which 
depend  for  their  character  upon  the  responsible  exercise  of  will — 
are  strangely  at  variance  with  the  idea  of  changeless  law.  Here, 
in  the  midst  of  a  universe  in  which  so  much  seems  to  tell  of  the 
resistless  march  of  triumphant  law,  is  a  whole  region  of  facts 
the  very  first  idea  of  which  is  the  idea  of  freedom  from  law. 
No  amount  of  argument  will  persuade  a  sane  man  that  he  is 
talking  nonsense  when  he  says,  "  I  can  take  the  right-hand  road 
or  the  left,  as  I  please  "  ;  "I  can  give  this  money  to  this  cause, 
or  I  can  refuse  "  ;  "I  can  speak,  or  I  can  be  silent  ".  You  may 
tell  him  each  separate  act  is  only  the  necessary  result  of  a 
combination  of  previous  forces,  or  of  the  force  at  the  moment 
strongest,  and  that  his  actions  always  follow  the  line  of  least 

^  J.  Brierley,  Life  and  tlie  Ideal,  71. 

'■'G.  J.  Romanes,  Christian  Prayer  and  General  Laws,  161. 


SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER    231 

resistance  ;  but  he  is  none  the  less  sure  that  he  is  a  free  agent, 
with  a  mysterious  power  of  will  through  which  he  acts.  There- 
fore at  once  we  find  at  least  one  class  of  facts  over  which  law 
seems  to  exercise  at  most  a  very  limited  control. 

We  cannot  alter  a  law  of  nature.  The  law  is  not  that  which 
acts  or  produces  any  result.  The  law  is  only  the  expression  of 
the  method  in  which  the  various  forces  around  us  operate.  We 
cannot  alter  a  law,  but  we  can  alter  the  operation  of  the  force 
which  is  regulated  by  law.  Thus  it  is  a  law  of  nature  that  by 
the  force  of  gravitation  a  stone  should  lie  motionless  on  the 
ground.  By  my  will  I  take  up  the  stone,  I  throw  it  up,  bringing 
to  bear  on  it  other  forces  sufficient  to  overcome  for  the  time  the 
action  of  the  force  of  gravitation.  I  catch  the  stone  as  it  de- 
scends, again  by  my  will  applying  another  force  to  correct  the 
action  of  the  force  of  gravitation.  We  can  all  think  of  a 
thousand  examples.  Why,  all  our  wonderful  inventions,  the 
steam-engine,  the  hydraulic  press,  the  electric  telegraph,  are 
nothing  else  but  the  Will  of  man  restraining,  combining,  direct- 
ing, and  utilizing  the  law-observing  forces  of  nature.  Thus 
we  have  not  only  a  vast  group  of  facts  apparently  ungoverned 
by  general  laws,  but  a  constant  interference  with  the  operation 
of  those  general  laws  by  that  force  which  originates  this  group 
of  facts,  namely,  the  will. 

IT  Mankind  was  never  meant  to  be  the  slave  of  laws,  but  their 
master ;  human  spirit  was  destined  to  rule  over  the  rest  of  God's 
creation,  with  nature  as  its  servant,  laws  and  ordinances  as  its 
willing  and  able  instruments.  To  turn  these  into  the  warders  of 
its  prison  is  an  anomaly.  The  religiously  scientific  mind,  while 
doing  full  justice  to  the  all-pervading  presence  and  power  of  law, 
is  coming,  increasingly,  to  realize  that  law  was  not  meant  to  limit 
and  fetter  personality,  but  was  made  subject  to  it ;  that  God 
made  human  personality  in  the  likeness  of  His  own,  and  there- 
fore so  constituted  it  that  it  is  able  to  manipulate  and  administer 
laws  like  Himself,  with  this  infinite  difference  that  He  is  omni- 
potent and  omniscient,  and  it  is  but  a  babe  in  these  attributes — a 
learner,  at  the  first  stages  of  acquiring  knowledge.  Taught  by 
God,  man  learns  how  one  law  can  counteract,  supersede,  or  modify 
another  without  confusion  or  collision.  The  laws  of  God,  natural 
and  spiritual,  when  rightly  understood,  are  the  friends  and  not 
the  foes  of  personality.  So  diverse  are  they  in  their  working,  so 
wondrously  adapted  to  further  every  beneficial  purpose,  that  in 


232     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

the  execution  of  any  scheme  that  is  good  and  wise,  far  from 
desiring  to  set  them  aside,  we  would  call  them  to  our  aid  if  we 
had  but  eyes  to  see.  Man  need  never  be  baffled  by  the  operation 
of  God's  laws.^ 

2.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  then,  we  can  and  do  interfere  with  the 
forces  of  nature;  and  by  our  interference  we  achieve  results 
which,  before  experience,  might  have  seemed  improbable  enough. 
What  we  can  do,  with  our  limited  knowledge  and  power,  could, 
we  must  suppose,  be  done  on  a  much  vaster  scale  by  one  who  was 
vastly  superior  in  these  respects.  Indeed  it  would  be  the  height 
of  rashness  to  attempt  to  set  any  bounds  to  what  would  be  possible 
in  such  a  case.  The  key  to  the  solution  of  the  mystery  of  answer 
to  prayer  lies  thus  in  our  own  possession  of  moral  freedom.  The 
all  but  universal  experience  of  humanity  is  that  within  limita- 
tions we  have  some  power  of  self-direction,  some  power  of  control, 
over  our  own  destinies.  We  praise  and  blame  ourselves  or  other 
people  according  to  the  way  in  which  that  power  is  exercised. 
But  this  moral  freedom  introduces  into  the  universe  a  certain 
element  of  uncertainty.  Within  the  illimitable  scope  of  God's 
almighty  purposes  there  is  room  for  man's  personal  initiative. 
But  if  the  reality  of  moral  freedom  is  conceded,  the  possibility 
of  answer  to  prayer  must  be  conceded  too. 

IF  Our  consciousness  is  essentially  a  self-directing  creative 
consciousness.  Under  its  directivity,  our  existence  is  an  unbroken 
process  of  self-adaptation  to  an  equally  unbroken  process  of 
change  in  a  surrounding  environment  with  which  our  own  exist- 
ence is  continuous  as  a  part  is  akin  to  its  whole.  In  this  process 
of  conscious  self -change,  each  moment  swallows  up  and  yet  re- 
tains all  the  preceding  moments  in  a  fuller  form  of  existence  by 
a  veritable  act  of  creation.  This  creation,  or  invention,  is  not 
caused  by  the  sum-total  of  preceding  acts,  though  it  rests  on 
them  and  re-fashions  them.  Our  existence,  directed  by  conscious- 
ness, is  a  sort  of  self -rolling  snowball  determining  its  own  direc- 
tion according  to  the  new  exigencies  of  each  moment.  .  .  .  No 
two  moments  of  our  real  life  can  ever  be  perfectly  alike.  How- 
ever conditioned  by  preceding  results,  each  fresh  moment  of  that 
life  imports  a  new  element  of  creative  invention  which  gives  to  the 
whole  moment  a  character  of  originality  which  no  human  know- 
ledge of  the  antecedents,  however  infinite,  could  possibly  foresee. ^ 

^  L.  Swetenham,  Conquering  Prayer,  148. 
2  H.  Bergson,  Creative  Evolution. 


SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER    233 

3.  What  is  true  of  man  is  no  less  true  of  God.  Put  it  the 
other  way.  What  is  true  of  prayer  in  relation  to  God  is  equally 
true  of  it  in  relation  to  man.  If  the  Divine  will  cannot  be 
affected  by  prayer,  no  more  can  the  human.  If  it  is  wrong  to 
ask  a  boon  of  the  Most  High  God,  so  is  it  to  ask  a  boon  of  a 
father  or  a  brother,  of  a  mother  or  a  sister,  or  of  a  friend.  Human 
nature,  as  philosophy  conceives  it,  no  less  than  the  Divine  nature, 
is  fast  locked  in  the  vice  of  necessity ;  there  is  not,  nor  can  there 
ever  be,  any  escape  from  it.  If,  then,  you  deny  to  human  souls 
the  infinite  privilege  of  praying  to  their  Father  in  Heaven  for 
help  in  their  sore  need,  you  must  logically  refrain  yourself  from 
asking  help  in  any  form  or  under  any  condition  from  any  son  of 
earth.  The  prayer  of  a  child  to  his  father  on  earth  is  precisely 
as  reasonable  or  unreasonable  as  the  prayer  of  a  man  to  God. 
But  who  will  own  that  such  a  prayer  can  lack  the  element  of 
reason  or  right  ?  Who  will  admit  that,  when  he  tries  to  prevail 
by  his  petition  upon  the  heart  of  a  kinsman  or  friend  in  whose 
love  he  confides,  such  an  act  is  immoral  or  illogical  ?  No  ;  it  is 
impossible  ;  human  nature  is  too  strong  for  philosophy.  And  as 
Dr.  Johnson  said  of  the  freedom  of  the  will,  "  We  know  our  will 
is  free,  and  there's  an  end  on't,"  so  we  may  say,  "  We  know  that 
human  hearts  are  moved  by  prayer,  and  no  argument  will  con- 
vince us  that  they  are  not  ".  But  from  human  hearts  the  ascent 
is  natural  to  the  Divine  heart.  For  our  Lord  Himself  drew  the 
parallel  between  Divine  and  human  parentage,  saying  :  "  If  a  son 
shall  ask  bread  of  any  of  you  that  is  a  father,  will  he  give  him  a 
stone  ?  or  if  he  ask  a  fish,  will  he  for  a  fish  give  him  a  serpent  ? 
...  If  ye  then,  being  evil,  know  how  to  give  good  gifts  unto 
your  children ;  how  much  more  shall  your  heavenly  Father  give 
the  Holy  Spirit  to  them  that  ask  him  ? " 

The  uniformity  of  nature,  so  far  as  we  have  discerned  it,  is 
nothing  but  the  expression  of  the  stability  of  God's  good  pleasure. 
The  sun  rises  every  morning,  and  we  shall  not  be  warm  without 
it.  It  is  the  signal  of  the  sure  mercies  of  God,  sure  in  their  re- 
currence, but  merciful  in  their  freedom.  .  .  .  The  very  work  of 
man  in  this  world  is  to  answer  to  the  signal ;  to  know  the  Father 
and  Jesus  Christ  whom  He  has  sent.  It  is  to  know  the  reality 
of  God's  controlling  power  and  the  clearness  of  His  manifestations 
within  our  own  flesh,  and  man  ought  to  come  to  know  this  by 


234    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

what  he  knows  of  his  own  limited  self-determination.  He  ought 
to  look  up  with  joy  and  reverence  to  God  and  adore  in  Him  a 
great  reality,  which  answers  to  that  small  but  real  spark  of  free- 
dom which  He  has  planted  in  us,  and  which  makes  the  possibility 
of  virtue  and  of  honour. 

IT  You  remember  the  old  image  of  the  mice  in  the  piano.  It 
is  an  image  invented  by  Dr.  W.  G.  Ward,  "  Ideal  "  Ward,  one  of 
the  men  of  the  Oxford  Movement.     The  image  is  this  : 

We  begin,  then,  with  imagining  two  mice,  endowed,  however, 
with  quasi-human  or  semi-human  intelligence,  enclosed  within  a 
grand  pianoforte,  but  prevented  in  some  way  or  other  from  inter- 
fering with  the  free  play  of  its  machinery.  From  time  to  time 
they  are  delighted  with  the  strains  of  choice  music.  One  of  the 
two  considers  these  to  result  from  some  agency  external  to  the 
instrument ;  but  the  other,  having  a  more  philosophical  mind, 
rises  to  the  conception  of  fixed  laws  and  phenomenal  uniformity. 
"  Science  as  yet,"  he  says,  "  is  but  in  its  infancy,  but  I  have  already 
made  one  or  two  important  discoveries.  Every  sound  which 
reaches  us  is  preceded  by  a  certain  vibration  of  these  strings. 
The  same  string  invariably  produces  the  same  sound,  and  that 
louder  or  more  gentle  according  as  the  vibration  may  be  more  or 
less  intense.  Sounds  of  a  more  composite  character  result  when 
two  or  more  of  the  strings  vibrate  together  ;  and  here,  again,  the 
sound  produced,  as  far  as  I  am  able  to  discover,  is  precisely  a  com- 
pound of  those  sounds  which  have  resulted  from  the  various  com- 
ponent strings  vibrating  separately.  Then  there  is  a  further 
sequence  which  I  have  observed ;  for  each  vibration  is  preceded 
by  a  stroke  from  a  corresponding  hammer,  and  the  string  vibrates 
more  intensely  in  proportion  as  the  hammer's  stroke  is  more 
forcible.  Thus  far  I  have  already  prosecuted  my  researches. 
And  so  much  at  least  is  evident  even  now,  viz.  that  the  sounds 
proceed  not  from  any  external  and  arbitrary  agency — from  the 
intervention,  e.g.,  of  any  higher  will — but  from  the  uniform  opera- 
tion of  fixed  laws.  These  laws  may  be  explored  by  intelligent 
mice,  and  to  their  exploration  I  shall  devote  my  life."  ^ 

IT  Can  the  humble  request  of  believing  lips  restrain,  accelerate, 
change  the  settled  order  of  events?  Can  prayer  make  things 
that  are  not  to  be  as  though  they  were  ?  Are  events,  in  short, 
brought  about  through  prayer  that  would  not  otherwise  take 
place  ?  Yes,  a  thousand  times  yes  !  To  believe  anything  short 
of  this  is  to  take  the  soul  out  of  every  text  that  refers  to  prayer,  is 

^  William  Oeorge  Ward  and  the  CaOwlic  Revival,  289. 


SCIENTIFIC  OBJECTIONS  TO  PRAYER    235 

to  do  away  with  the  force  of  every  scriptural  illustration  that  bears 
upon  it — to  believe  anything  short  of  this  is  to  believe  that  God 
has  placed  a  mighty  engine  in  the  hands  of  His  creature,  but  one 
that  will  not  work,  useful  only  as  a  scientific  toy  might  be  that 
helps  to  bring  out  a  child's  faculties,  valuable  only  as  a  means  of 
training  the  soul  to  commune  with  God.  Yet  what  so  easy  for 
the  unbeliever  as  to  cavil  at  prayer ;  what  so  easy  even  for  the 
Christian  as  to  fail  and  falter  in  this  region,  and  to  stop  short  of 
the  fulness  of  this,  God's  own  Land  of  Promise,  through  unbelief  ? 
The  commonplace  objection  to  prayer,  founded  upon  the  supposed 
immutability  of  the  laws  by  which  God  governs  the  world,  is 
easily  met  and  answered  by  the  fact  that  prayer  is  itself  one  of 
these  laws,  upon  whose  working  God  has  determined  that  a 
certain  result  shall  follow  : 

An  element 
That  comes  and  goes  unseen,  yet  doth  effect 
Rare  issues  by  its  operance.^ 

^  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays,  135. 


XII. 
Philosophical  Objections  to  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Ballard,  F.,  in  Is  Christianity  True  ?,(1904). 

Bernard,  St.,  Works  (ed.  Eales),  iii.  (1896). 

Brown,  W.  A.,  Christian  Theology  in  Outline  (1907). 

Campbell,  R.  J.,  vl  Faith  for  To-Day  (1900).    > 

Clarke,  W.  N.,  An  Outline  of  Christian  Theology  (1898). 

Everett,  C.  C,  Theism  and  the  Christian  Faith  (1909). 

Gore,  C,  Prayer,  and  the  Lord's  Prayer  (1898). 

Greenwell,  Dora,  Essays  (1867). 

Hessey,  J.  A.,  Moral  Difficulties  connected  with  the  Bible,  iii.  (1873). 

Illingworth,  J.  R.,  University  and  Cathedral  Sermons  (1893). 

Ingram,  A.  F.  W.,  The  Call  of  the  Father  (1907). 

Irving,  Edward,  Collected  Writiiigs^  iii.  (1865). 

Jackson,  G.,  The  Teaching  of  Jesus  (1903). 

Kaftan,  J.,  Die  Christliche  Lehre  vom  Gebet  (1876). 

Liddon,  H.  P.,  Some  Elements  of  Religion  (1873). 

MacDonald,  G.,  Unspoken  Sermons,  ii.  (1891). 

Martensen,  H.,  Christian  Ethics,  i.  (1881). 

Matheson,  G.,  Times  of  Retirement  (1901). 

,,  ,,      Rests  by  the  River  (1906). 

Moflfatt,  J.,  Reasons  and  Reasons  (1911). 
Roberts,  J.  E.,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions  (1908). 
Robinson,  F. ,  College  and  Ordination  Addresses  (1905). 
Schleiermacher,  F.  E.,  Selected  Sermons  (1890). 
Sclater,  J.  R.  P.,  The  Enterprise  of  Life  (1911). 
Smith,  D.,  Christian  Counsel. 

Steven,  G.,  The  Psychology  of  the  Christian  Soul  (1911). 
Stevenson,  W.  F.,  Praying  and  Working  (1862). 
Thomas,  J.,  The  Mysteries  of  Grace. 
Tindale,  W. ,  Expositions  and  Notes  (ed.  of  1849). 
.  Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 
Christus  Futurus  (1907). 

Hibbert  Journal,  ix.  (1911),  385  (C.  Stewart),  660  (C.  F.  D'Arcy). 
London  Quarterly  Review,  July,  1908,  p.  1  (P.  T.  Forsyth). 


838 


Philosophical  Objections  to  Prayer. 

1.  In  passing  from  the  objections  to  prayer  made  from  the  side 
of  science  to  those  which  are  of  a  more  philosophical  or  theologi- 
cal character,  let  us  see  how  the  doctrine  of  prayer  is  modified, 
or  may  yet  be  modified,  by  the  growing  study  of  psychology. 
Modern  psychology  is  changing  all  the  old  landmarks  of  that 
science.  Two  facts  are  gaining  prominence.  One  concerns  the 
direct  influence  of  mind  on  mind.  Amidst  all  the  clashing  of 
opinions  as  to  the  exact  value  of  so-called  spiritualistic  phenomena, 
it  is  important  to  remember  that  scientific  belief  is  steadily  veering 
towards  an  acceptance  of  many  facts  proving  the  transference  of 
thoughts  in  hitherto  unrecognized  ways.  Such  distinguished 
scientists  as  Sir  William  Crookes  and  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  accept  the 
facts  of  telepathy  very  decidedly.  At  the  least,  it  may  be  con- 
ceded by  all  that  mind-transferences  are  not  so  dependent  upon 
material  organs  as  we  imagined.  In  physical  science  the  amazing 
discovery  has  been  made  that  electrical  energy  can  be  transmitted 
over  vast  distances  without  any  connecting  wires.  A  precisely 
similar  advance  is  being  made  in  psychical  science.  Wireless 
telegraphy  is  possible  in  the  mental  sphere  as  well  as  in  the 
material  world. 

The  other  fact  is  the  existence  of  sub-consciousness  in  the 
individual.  Very  little  is  known  with  certainty  about  this  dim 
region.  But  it  is  quite  clear  that  the  roadway  of  our  thoughts 
is  built  upon  arches.  The  goods  that  are  carried  along  that 
elevated  road  are  then  stored  under  the  arches ;  and  they  may 
be  brought  up  again  on  any  day.  Our  mental  life  has  its  horizon, 
where  the  sky  of  our  impressions  seems  to  meet  the  ocean  of  our 
consciousness ;  but  thoughts  that  sink  beneath  the  horizon  are 
no  more  extinguished  than  the  sun  is  when  it  sets  in  the  west, 
and,  like  it,  they  will  rise  again  into  view.  Now,  it  is  highly 
probable  that  this  sub-conscious  region  is  capable  of  receiving 
impressions  that  do  not  appeal  to  our  conscious  life.     Tints  that 

239 


240    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

awaken  no  sensation  in  the  eye,  tones  that  lie  beyond  the  dull 
hearing  of  the  ear,  may  find  a  responsive  faculty  in  this  mysteri- 
ous region  of  being.  The  sub-conscious  area  or  state  may  be 
likened  to  the  receiving  instrument  for  Marconigrams.  It  may 
be  sensitive  to  suggestions  sent  out  by  other  minds,  and  may 
interpret  them  for  consciousness. 

Do  not  these  two  facts  offer  a  strictly  scientific  basis  for  a 
doctrine  of  intercessory  prayer  ?  He  who  prays  may  be  radiat- 
ing forth  from  himself  waves  of  mental  energy  highly  charged 
with  ethical  significance.  He  for  whom  prayer  is  made  may 
receive  these  ripples,  whether  consciously  or  unconsciously,  and 
will  be  influenced  by  their  moral  message.  A  Christian  does 
not  need  any  such  theory  to  urge  him  to  pray  for  others.  But 
the  hints  which  psychical  science  is  throwing  out  so  rapidly  are 
an  encouragement  to  those  who  sympathize  with  Tennyson's 
desire — 

Let  knowledge  grow  from  more  to  more, 
But  more  of  reverence  in  us  dwell ; 
That  mind  and  soul,  according  well, 

May  make  one  music  as  before, 

But  vaster. 

2.  There  are  other  ways  in  which  the  study  of  psychology  is 
throwing  light  on  the  problems  of  prayer.  Thus  it  is  a  fact  of 
experience  that  to  pray  against  certain  sins  to  which  we  have 
rendered  ourselves  liable  is  to  strengthen  them  ;  and  that  for  the 
reason  that  prayer  against  them  is  directing  attention  to  them, 
and  to  direct  our  attention  to  them  is  to  find  ourselves  once  more 
enjoying  them,  which  is  more  than  half  the  victory  for  the 
sin.  This  explains  why  some  men  sin  in  spite  of  their  prayers. 
Delacroix,  in  describing  the  life  of  St.  Teresa,  says  :  "  This  state 
of  division  and  war  kept  her  tendencies  in  check,  but  also  kept 
them  alive  ".  The  continual  struggle  against  sin  keeps  it  active. 
Men  fight  their  iniquities  and  their  temptations  hand  to  hand, 
and  the  more  they  do  so  the  stronger  the  iniquities  or  the  tempta- 
tions become. 

Psychology  tells  us  to  turn  our  eyes  away  from  the  sin.  And 
with  this  the  gospel  agrees :  "  looking  away  unto  Jesus  ".  The 
only  effective  inhibition  of  any  inward  evil  is  to  turn  the  attention 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  241 

not  on  the  evil  we  mean  to  flee  but  on  the  life  we  mean  to  attain. 
Forgetting  the  things  which  are  behind,  we  press  towards  the 
mark  of  our  high  calling.  And  we  forget,  not  by  trying  to 
forget,  but  by  setting  our  mind  on  the  goal.  We  do  not  first  die 
to  sin  in  order  that  we  may  thereafter  live  to  God ;  we  live  to 
God,  and  so  die  to  sin. 

![  In  my  boyhood  I  was  taken  to  see  a  famous  quarry.  Over 
what  appeared  to  me  a  great  gulf  had  been  made  a  pathway  one 
plank  broad  for  wheel-barrows,  and  over  that  perilous  path 
quarrymen  were  wheeling  loads  of  earth.  I  asked  how  the  thing 
was  possible,  and  a  quarryman  explained  that  he  was  able  to 
wheel  the  barrow  without  stumbling  by  fixing  his  eye  on  the 
farther  goal.  He  did  not  ignore  the  gulf  and  the  danger,  cer- 
tainly did  not  deny  their  existence  ;  he  was  aware  of  them.  It 
was  because  of  their  presence  that  he  kept  his  eye  fixed  on  the 
goal  But  it  was  his  concentrated  attention  on  that  that  kept 
him  safe.^ 

3.  Coming  now  to  the  philosophical  or  theological  difficulties 
which  have  been  felt  against  prayer,  we  may  begin  with  the 
practical  objection  that  the  self-reliant  man  finds  no  use  for  prayer; 
next  touch  the  rather  superficial  objection  that  where  interests 
difier  prayer  is  an  absurdity ;  then  pass  to  the  now  nearly  ex- 
ploded but  once  formidable  argument  that  man  is  too  insignificant 
for  God  to  attend  to  his  prayers.  When  these  three  objections  are 
shortly  discussed,  we  shall  still  have  to  deal  with  the  two  great 
difficulties,  that  God's  providence  being  already  perfect  cannot  be 
deflected  in  any  direction  by  the  prayer  of  man,  and  that  in  any 
case  God's  will  is  unalterable. 

I. 

Our  Selp-Sufficiency. 

"After  all,"  we  say,  "do  we  not  depend  on  our  own  efforts 
for  being  what  we  are,  and  for  doing  what  we  do  ? "  Whatever 
God  may  see  fit  to  do  for  us,  our  best  form  of  prayer  is  work ;  it 
is  the  determination  to  secure  what  we  want  by  personal  efforts 
to  get  it.     The  indolent  or  the  imaginative  may  be  left  to  lengthen 

^  George  Steven,  The  Piychology  of  the  Christian  Soult  134. 

i6 


242    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

out  their  litanies ;  but  practical  men  will  fall  back  upon  the  wise 
proverb  that  "  God  helps  those  who  help  themselves  ". 

1.  The  first  answer  is  that  the  supposed  incompatibility  of 
prayer  with  self-reliance  is  a  good  deal  grounded  on  the  belief 
that  prayer  is  to  be  used  alone.  Of  course,  there  have  been 
fanatics — there  are  some  in  our  own  day — who  will  not,  for  instance, 
employ  a  physician  in  a  child's  sickness,  lest  they  should  be  sup- 
posed to  be  trusting  in  other  help  than  in  God's  answer  to  prayer. 
They  might  be  asked,  very  pertinently,  whether  they  carry  out 
this  principle  in  reference  to  seeking  for  food  and  clothing  for 
themselves;  whether  prayer  is  the  only  means  to  which  they 
resort  for  daily  bread.  But  it  would  be  ridiculous  to  found  an 
argument  against  prayer  on  such  a  delusion.  The  truer  maxim 
is  "  Ora  et  labora " — Pray,  that  your  labour  may  be  blessed ; 
labour,  lest  your  very  prayer  be  an  excuse  for  inactivity.  If  you 
value  prayer  do  not  let  it  be  brought  into  disrepute  by  your 
sluggishness.  No  promise  is  given  to  those  who  neglect  ordinary 
means.  If  you  will  not  vaccinate  your  child,  if  you  will  not 
drain  and  ventilate  your  dwelling,  if  you  will  not  attach  lightning 
conductors  to  the  tall  chimneys  of  your  factory,  if  you  will  not 
lay  up  provision  for  your  old  age,  what  will  be  the  result  ?  The 
unpraying,  who  in  these  practical  matters  have  been,  in  their 
generation,  wiser  than  yourself,  will  appear  more  prosperous  than 
you  who  profess  to  have  prayed.  And  not  merely  will  your 
misfortunes  obtain  little  sympathy,  but  prayer,  through  your 
abuse  of  it,  will  incur  contempt.  Remember  those  weighty, 
though  quaint,  words  of  Dr.  Donne  : — 

Hands  are  of  double  oflice  ;  for  the  ground 

We  till  with  them,  and  them  to  Heaven  we  raise : 

Who  prayerless  labours,  or  without  this  prays. 
Doth  but  one  half,  that's  none. 

IF  Nor  are  prayer  and  work  connected  by  any  arbitrary  link, 
but  as  ditterent  aspects  of  the  same  man.  "Ora  et  labora," 
writes  Dr.  Wichern  in  one  of  his  pleasant  papers,  "  is  carved  on 
a  peasant's  house  in  the  Vierland.  *  It  must  be  French,'  said  a 
neighbour's  wife,  as  I  stood  looking  at  the  legend,  but  you  know 
it  just  means  : — 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  243 

With  this  hand  work,  and  with  the  other  pray, 
And  God  will  bless  them  both  from  day  to  day."  ^ 

IT  One  of  the  best-known  pictures  of  the  last  half-century  is 
Millet's  "  Angelus  ".  The  scene  is  a  potato  field,  in  the  midst  of 
which,  and  occupying  the  foreground  of  the  picture,  are  two 
figures,  a  young  man  and  a  young  woman.  Against  the  distant 
sky-line  is  the  steeple  of  a  church.  It  is  the  evening  hour,  and 
as  the  bell  rings  which  calls  the  villagers  to  worship,  the  workers 
in  the  field  lay  aside  the  implements  of  their  toil  and,  with  folded 
hands  and  bowed  heads,  stand  for  a  moment  in  silent  prayer. 
It  is  a  picture  of  what  every  life  should  be,  of  what  every  life 
must  be,  which  has  taken  as  its  pattern  the  Perfect  Life  in  which 
work  and  prayer  are  blent  like  bells  of  sweet  accord.'-^ 

2.  In  the  second  place  there  may  be  cases  where  labour  ordinarily 
so-called  is  ineffectual.  A  ship  is  foundering,  the  boats  have  been 
dashed  in  pieces,  the  pumps  are  powerless,  and  no  friendly  vessel 
is  nigh.  Then  prayer  and  labour  are  synonymous.  The  sinking 
crew  can  only  pray  for  resignation  and  preparedness  for  their 
end.  A  child  is  at  the  point  of  death,  all  remedies  have  been 
tried — tried  prayerfully,  we  will  believe — in  vain.  Then,  too, 
prayer  and  labour  become  most  clearly  synonymous.  Nothing 
can  be  carried  on  but  prayer  that  God  will  receive  the  departing 
soul,  and  comfort  and  sustain  the  bereaved  survivors.  And  the 
following  fact  has  been  frequently  noticed  as  a  proof  that  prayer 
is  a  labour,  is  a  bringing  out  of  latent  power  into  energy,  is  a 
means  to  some  result :  the  most  self-reliant  persons,  as  they  are 
called,  in  life,  have  bethought  themselves  in  their  dying  hour  of  a 
hitherto  unexercised  part  of  self.     To  this  effect  spoke  Wolsey : — 

O  Cromwell,  Cromwell, 
Had  I  but  serv'd  my  God  with  half  the  zeal 
I  serv'd  my  king,  He  would  not  in  mine  age 
Have  left  me  naked  to  mine  enemies. 

Now,  what  is  this  but  an  acknowledgment  that  prayer  had  not 
been  duly  used  hitherto  ? 

Such  is  our  weakness  that  we  constantly  tend  to  a  one-sided 
use  of  God's  gifts.  We  are  either  exclusively  speculative  and 
contemplative  on  the  one  hand,  or  we  are  absorbingly  practical 

^  W.  F.  Stevenson,  Praying  and  Workingy  5. 
2  G.  Jackson,  The  Teaching  of  JestiSy  161. 


244    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

and  men  of  action  on  the  other.  Either  exaggeration  is  fatal  to 
the  true  life  of  religion,  which  binds  the  soul  to  God  by  faith  as 
well  as  by  love ;  by  love  not  less  than  by  faith ;  by  a  life  of 
energetic  service  not  less  truly  than  by  a  life  of  communion  with 
light  and  truth.  It  is  in  prayer  that  each  element  is  at  once 
quickened  in  itself  and  balanced  by  the  presence  of  the  other. 
The  great  masters  and  teachers  of  Christian  doctrine  have  always 
found  in  prayer  their  highest  source  of  illumination.  The  great- 
est practical  resolves  that  have  enriched  and  beautified  human 
life  in  Christian  times  have  been  arrived  at  in  prayer,  ever  since 
the  day  when,  at  the  most  solemn  service  of  the  Apostolic  Church, 
the  Holy  Ghost  said,  "  Separate  me  Barnabas  and  Saul  for  the 
work  whereunto  I  have  called  them  ". 

IF  Mr.  Blatchford  says  that  he  thinks  that  even  if  there  be 
any  benefit  in  prayer,  "  it  is  bought  too  dearly  at  the  price  of  a 
decrease  in  our  self-reliance.  I  do  not  think  it  is  good  for  a  man 
to  be  always  asking  for  help,  or  for  benefits,  or  for  pardon.  It 
seems  to  me  that  such  a  habit  must  tend  to  weaken  character." 
Will,  then,  any  doctor  affirm  that  to  breathe  deeply  in  pure  air, 
as  a  habit,  is  to  weaken  the  lungs  ?  If  he  will  say  Yes  to  that, 
we  may  accept  such  a  statement  as  is  here  quoted.  But  never 
until  then.  Rather,  to  look  at  this  notion  carefully,  but  for  a 
moment,  is  to  see  how  misrepresenting  it  is.  Indeed  it  is  not 
only  absurd  in  itself,  but  flatly  contradictory  to  history,  dia- 
metrically opposed  to  observation,  utterly  at  variance  with  ex- 
perience, and  contradicted  entirely  by  the  writer  himself.  For 
what  does  he  acknowledge  ?  "  The  act  of  prayer  gives  courage 
and  confidence  in  proportion  to  the  faith  of  him  who  prays." 
When  he  prays  "he  is  rousing  up  his  dormant  faculty  of  resist- 
ance and  desire  for  righteousness  ".  Is  that  weakening  character  ? 
So  far  as  we  know  anything  of  human  nature  and  human  life, 
surely  that  is  the  kind  of  influence  upon  character  which,  above 
all  else,  in  modern  England  and  indeed  throughout  Europe,  this 
generation  needs.  And  as  to  the  past,  what  is  the  name  of  the 
strongest  man  in  English  history  ?  Does  any  one  hesitate  ? 
Surely  not  for  more  than  two  seconds.  Is  it  not  one  to  whom 
we  owe  our  most  glorious  liberties,  Oliver  Cromwell  ?  It  may  be 
questioned  whether  any  stronger  man  is  to  be  found  in  the  whole 
history  of  civilization.  But  what  do  we  read  concerning  him  ? 
I  refer  you  to  Green's  History  of  the  English  People.  Listen  to 
what  is  there  said  about  Cromwell :  "  Cromwell  '  spent  much 
time  with  God  in  prayer  before  the  storm  '  of  Basing  House  ". 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  245 

This,  we  know,  was  typical  of  his  general  procedure.  And  what 
about  his  men  ?  "  The  regiment  of  a  thousand  men  which  Crom- 
well raised  for  the  Association  of  the  Eastern  Counties,  was 
formed  strictly  of  '  men  of  religion  *.  '  A  lovely  company  *  he 
tells  his  friends  with  soldierly  pride.  No  blasphemy,  drinking, 
disorder,  or  impiety  were  suffered  in  their  ranks."  ^  Were  they, 
then,  weaklings  ?  If  one  may  discern  the  signs  of  the  times,  what 
is  wanted  more  than  ever  in  modern  England  on  the  side  of  truth 
and  righteousness  is  a  host  of  men  as  "  weak  "  as  Cromwell's 
Ironsides  and  their  leader.  For  verily  if  these  our  valiant  fore- 
fathers were  made  what  they  were  by  prayer,  and  you  and  I 
have  the  social  as  well  as  the  spiritual  weal  of  our  land  at  heart, 
then  I  submit  that  on  the  testimony  of  history  the  very  best 
thing  we  could  do  would  be  to  turn  all  England  into  one  vast 
assembly  for  genuine  prayer.  Prayer  the  weakener  of  character  ! 
Well,  indeed,  may  we  avow  that  such  a  thought  is  contrary  alike 
to  experience  and  to  observation. - 

IF  True  prayer  (if  they  complained  and  sought  help  either  for 
themselves,  or  for  their  neighbours,  and  trusted  in  the  promise  of 
God)  would  so  comfort  the  soul  and  courage  the  heart,  that  the 
body,  though  it  were  half  dead  and  more,  would  revive  and  be 
lusty  again,  and  the  labour  would  be  short  and  easy  :  as  for  an 
example ;  if  thou  were  so  oppressed  that  thou  were  weary  of  thy 
life,  and  wentest  to  the  king  for  help,  and  haddest  sped,  thy 
spirits  would  so  rejoice,  that  thy  body  would  receive  her  strength 
again,  and  be  as  lusty  as  ever  it  was ;  even  so  the  promises  of 
God  work  joy  above  all  measure,  where  they  be  believed  in  the 
heart.* 

II. 

The  War  of  Interests. 

1.  To  suppose  that  God  can  answer  individual  prayers  for 
specific  blessings  is  inconsistent,  we  are  told,  with  any  serious 
appreciation  of  human  interests.  One  man  or  nation  asks  for 
that  which  may  be  an  injury  to  another.  The  Spaniards  prayed 
for  the  success  of  their  Armada  :  the  English  prayed  against  it. 
Both  could  not  be  listened  to.  The  weather  cannot  consult  the 
convenience  of  everybody  at  once ;  and  therefore  the  specific 

1  Green,  A  Short  History  of  the  English  People,  554. 

2  F.  Ballard,  in  Is  Christianity  True  ?  229. 

2  William  Tindale,  Expositions  and  Notes  (ed.  of  1849),  80. 


246     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

prayers  of  well-meaning  villagers,  if  they  could  be  attended  to, 
could  be  attended  to  only  by  a  God  who,  instead  of  being  the 
Father  of  all  His  creatures,  reserved  special  indulgences  for  His 
favourites. 

•r  ^sop  was  only  a  Pagan,  yet  he  taught  many  truths  in  his 
homely  fashion  which  Christians  may  profitably  lay  to  heart. 
Here  is  one  of  his  Fables :  "  A  certain  man  had  two  daughters, 
and  he  married  one  to  a  gardener  and  the  other  to  a  potter. 
After  a  while  he  went  to  the  gardener's  wife  and  asked  her  how 
she  was,  and  how  they  were  thriving.  She  said  they  had  every- 
thing, but  there  was  one  thing  that  they  were  prapng  for — rain 
to  refresh  the  plants.  By  and  by  he  visited  the  potter's  wife, 
and  asked  her  likewise  how  she  was;  and  she  said  they  had 
everything  else  that  they  needed,  and  there  was  only  one  thing 
that  they  were  praying  for — a  continuance  of  fair  weather  and 
sunshine  to  dry  the  clay.  '  If,'  said  he,  '  you  are  seeking  for 
fair  weather  and  your  sister  for  rain,  which  of  you  am  I  to  join 
with  in  prayer  ? '  "  ^ 

2.  But  every  prayer  for  specific  blessings  in  a  Christian  soul 
is  tacitly,  if  not  expressly,  conditioned.  The  three  conditions 
which  are  always  understood  are  given  at  the  beginning  of  the 
Lord's  Prayer — *'  Hallowed  be  thy  name.  Thy  kingdom  come. 
Thy  will  be  done  ".  In  effect  these  three  conditions  are  only  one. 
If  a  change  of  weather,  or  a  restoration  to  health,  or  any  blessing 
whatever  be  prayed  for,  a  Christian  petitioner  deliberately  wills 
that  his  prayer  should  be  refused,  supposing  that  to  grant  it 
should  in  any  way  obscure  God's  glory  in  other  minds,  or  hinder 
the  advance  of  His  Kingdom,  and  so  contravene  what  must  be 
His  will.  Every  Christian  tacitly  adds  to  every  prayer,  "  Never- 
theless not  my  will,  but  thine,  be  done  ". 

^  Two  sides  are  praying  for  victory — how  can  God  answer 
both  ?  Why,  by  bringing  to  pass  what  is  right.  There  is  only 
one  will  of  God  The  will  of  God  is  right,  whatever  it  is,  and 
there  is  one  right.  We  do  not  know  which  the  right  is.  We 
may  be  quite  conscientiously  fighting  for  what  we  think  right, 
but  as  both  sides  pray  to  God,  God  answers  with  the  right 
answer,  which  is  best  for  both.'-^ 

1 D.  Smith,  Christian  Counsel,  201. 

«  Bishop  Winnington  Ingram,  The  Call  of  the  Father,  74. 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  247 

IF  The  criterion  of  true  prayer  is  that  it  should  be  the  expres- 
sion of  nobleness  in  the  man  who  prays.  It  is  the  spiritual 
nature  reaching  upward.  Anything  that  falls  below  this  level  is 
not  prayer.     Agamemnon,  in  the  Iliad,  asks  of  Zeus  that  he  may 

the  haughty  walls  of  Priam's  house 
Lay  prostrate  in  the  dust ;  and  burn  with  fire 
His  lofty  gates  ;  and  strip  from  Hector's  breast 
His  sword-rent  tunic,  while  around  his  corpse 
Many  brave  comrades,  prostrate,  bite  the  dust. 

While  Achilles  persuades  his  goddess-mother,  Thetis,  to  intercede 
with  the  king  of  the  gods  that 

the  routed  Greeks 
Back  to  their  ships  with  slaughter  may  be  driven ; 
That  all  may  taste  the  folly  of  their  king, 
And  Agamemnon's  haughty  self  may  mourn 
The  slight  on  Grecia's  bravest  warrior  cast. 

Here  are  two  conflicting  prayers.  Zeus  cannot  honour  both,  and 
we  feel  that  he  ought  not  to  honour  either.  They  are  not  the 
expressions  of  nobleness  in  the  men  who  prayed.  They  are  no 
more  than  the  natural  desires  of  imperfect  natures,  yet  they  are 
petitions  addressed  to  deity. ^ 

How  we,  poor  players  on  Life's  little  stage, 
Thrust  blindly  at  each  other  in  our  rage. 
Quarrel  and  fret,  and  rashly  dare  to  pray 
To  God  to  help  us  on  our  selfish  way. 

We  think  to  move  Him  with  our  prayer  and  praise. 
To  serve  our  needs ;  as  in  the  old  Greek  days 
Their  gods  came  down  and  mingled  in  the  fight 
With  mightier  arms  the  flying  foe  to  smite. 

The  laughter  of  those  gods  pealed  down  to  men. 
For  heaven  was  but  earth's  upper  story  then, 
Where  goddesses  about  an  apple  strove. 
And  the  high  gods  fell  humanly  in  love. 

We  own  a  God  whose  presence  fills  the  sky, — 
Whose  sleepless  eyes  behold  the  worlds  roll  by ; 
Shall  not  His  memory  number,  one  by  one, 
The  sons  of  men,  who  call  them  each  His  son  ?  ^ 

1 R.  J.  Campbell,  A  Faith  for  To-Day,  310. 
2  Louise  Chandler  Moulton, 


248     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

3.  If  God  should  think  fit  to  grant  a  large  proportion  of  the 
particular  requests  which  would  be  found  among  the  daily  prayers 
of  an  earnest  Christian,  He  would  not,  to  say  the  least,  thereby 
do  any  injury  to  others,  whether  they  were  Christians  or  not. 
Prayer  for  the  highest  well-being  of  any  human  being  may  be 
granted  without  damaging  other  human  beings.  If  God  should 
condescend  in  answer  to  prayer  to  teach  one  of  His  servants 
more  humility,  purity,  or  love,  this  would  not  oblige  Him  to 
withdraw  spiritual  graces  from  any  others  in  order  to  do  it. 
Nor  are  other  persons  the  worse  for  coming  into  contact  with 
one  whom  God  has  made  loving,  or  pure,  or  humble,  in  answer 
to  prayer.  Is  it  not  near  the  truth  to  say  that  they  are  likely  to 
be  much  better,  and  therefore  that  a  large  number  of  answers  to 
prayer  for  personal  blessings  necessarily  extend  in  their  effects 
beyond  those  who  are  immediately  blessed  ? 

IT  "  Thy  prayers  and  thine  alms  are  come  up  for  a  memorial 
before  God  "  (Acts  x.  4) — "  Thy  prayers  and  thine  alms  ".  What 
a  singular  combination  !  Are  not  these  two  contrary  things  ? 
Is  not  prayer  a  desire  to  get ;  is  not  the  oifer  of  alms  a  desire  to 
give  ^  How  can  a  man  receive  a  monument  for  opposing  qualities  ? 
My  brother,  these  are  not  opposing  qualities.  All  prayer  must 
be  a  giving  of  something.  You  are  not  justified  in  making  it  a 
mere  desire  to  get.  When  you  are  about  to  ask  anything  of  your 
Father,  you  ought  to  pause  for  a  moment.  Before  making  a 
request  to  your  Father,  you  should  give  your  sympathy  to  your 
fellow-man  ;  you  should  say — **  How  would  the  granting  of  this 
to  me  affect  him  ?  Let  me  remember  his  wants  ere  I  satisfy  my 
own  !  "  That  is  what  I  understand  our  Lord  to  mean  by  the 
command — "  When  thou  bringest  thine  offering  to  the  altar  and 
thou  rememberest  that  thy  brother  hath  aught  against  thee,  leave 
thine  offering  unsurrendered ;  first  be  reconciled  to  thy  brother  !  " 
When  you  come  to  the  altar  of  worship  to  offer  up  your  prayer, 
ask  yourself  first  of  all  whether  the  granting  of  your  wish  would 
be  against  the  interest  of  your  neighbour;  and  if  your  heart 
says  "  Yes,"  do  not  present  that  prayer  to-day.  Leave  it  on  the 
steps  of  the  altar.  Go  back  to  secular  life  again.  Seek  a  meet- 
ing with  your  neighbour.  Adjust  your  respective  claims.  Try 
if  his  interest  can  be  made  compatible  with  yours.  If  it  can, 
you  may  go  forward  to  the  altar  once  more.  Your  prayer  will 
then  be  unsullied,  pure.  There  will  be  nothing  mean  in  it, 
nothing  sordid,  nothing  self-seeking.     It  will  be  such  a  prayer 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  249 

as  you  can  present  without  shame  in  the  presence  of  the  minis- 
trant  angels,  in  the  presence  of  redeeming  Love.^ 

III. 

What  is  Man  ? 

1.  A  third  argument  directed  against  the  efficacy  of  prayer 
seems,  at  first  sight,  to  appeal  to  the  humility  which  must  ever 
be  characteristic  of  the  creature  face  to  face  with  his  Creator. 
It  is  the  difficulty  which,  with  deepest  feeling,  was  expressed  by 
the  Psalmist  when,  in  contemplation  of  the  infinite  vastness  of 
the  heavens,  he  was  lost  in  wonder  at  the  fact  that  so  insignificant 
a  being  as  man  should  be  chosen  by  God  as  the  object  of  His 
special  regard : — 

"  When  I  consider  thy  heavens,  the  work  of  thy  fingers, 
The  moon  and  the  stars,  which  thou  hast  ordained ; 
What  is  man,  that  thou  art  mindful  of  him  ? 
And  the  son  of  man,  that  thou  visitest  him  ? " 

In  the  original  the  contrast  is  even  stronger  than  in  the  transla- 
tion, for  the  words  for  ''  man  "  (Enosh,  Ben-adam)  are  chosen 
to  emphasize  man's  frailty,  and  mortality,  and  earthly  origin,  in 
contrast  to  the  vast  and  apparently  unchanging  structure  of  the 
heavens.  But  the  contrast  deepens  yet  further  as  we  realize  that, 
to  whatever  period  of  Jewish  history  this  psalm  may  belong,  the 
writer's  knowledge  of  the  vastness  of  the  creation,  and  of  the 
nature  of  celestial  phenomena,  was  almost  as  nothing  in  com- 
parison with  what  we  know  of  it.  To  us  the  revelation,  through 
the  telescope,  of  space  which  appears  illimitable,  through  the 
microscope,  of  minuteness  almost  infinite,  the  discovery  of  forces 
close  to  us  and  around  us,  but,  until  recently,  unsuspected  and 
unemployed,  gives  to  the  ancient  words  of  the  Psalmist,  when 
taken  on  our  lips,  a  power  and  a  pathos  such  as  he  would  not 
have  felt. 

2.  It  is  in  writings  such  as  the  Thoughts  of  Blaise  Pascal,  or 
passages  in  the  works  of  Cardinal  Newman  or  Dean  Church, 
that  we  are  helped  to  break  through  the  sway  of  custom  and 
habit  in  regarding  our  position,  and  to  enter  into  the  wonder  of 

G.  Matheaon,  Times  of  Retirement^  242. 


250    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

our  apparent  insignificance,  and  yet  more  of  our  true  greatness. 
But  the  Psalmist,  in  his  amazement  at  the  Creator's  "  visitation  " 
of  man  in  constant,  loving,  providential  regard,  knew  also  the 
solution  of  the  difficulty.  The  reason  why  man  in  bodily  in- 
firmity and  insignificance,  placed  in  a  world  which  is  almost  a 
speck  in  comparison  with  the  sun  which  governs  our  system,  and 
yet  more  with  hundreds  and  thousands  of  suns  governing  other 
systems,  is  the  object  of  Divine  care,  is  expressed  in  the  words  by 
which  his  own  question  is  answered : — 

"  For  thou  hast  made  him  but  little  lower  than  God, 

And  crownest  him  with  glory  and  honour. 

Thou  madest  him  to  have  dominion  over  the  works  of  thy  hands ; 

Thou  hast  put  all  things  under  his  feet." 

As  a  spirit  conscious  of  his  own  existence,  and  determining  his 
action  in  the  freedom  of  his  will,  man  is  the  **  crown,  and  glory, 
and  perfection  of  God's  creation".  If  creation  grows  upon  us, 
startling  us  with  a  sense  of  its  vastness,  we  can  in  the  very  light 
of  those  great  advances  of  scientific  discovery  and  human  control 
over  our  system  discern  the  pledge  of  man's  lofty  destiny,  and 
also  the  assurance  that  God  will  attend  to  his  prayers  and  mani- 
fest His  care. 

3.  And  if  we  pass  from  the  true  conception  of  man  to  the 
thought  of  the  Divine  omniscience  with  which  the  Divine  omnipo- 
tence is  inseparably  united,  there  is  one  further  assurance  that, 
while  we  cannot  conceive  how  God  can  attend  to  each  member  of 
the  human  race,  we  can  rationally  believe  that  He  does  so.  "  To 
know  well,"  writes  Bishop  Gore,  "is  to  know  both  broadly  and 
in  detail.  And  to  act  well  is  to  act  with  a  wide  grasp,  and  also 
an  insight  into  each  individual  case."  In  education,  the  master 
whose  skill,  not  only  in  imparting  knowledge  but  in  forming 
character,  is  the  highest  is  the  teacher  who,  like  Arnold  or  Thring, 
holds  in  combination  the  government  and  guidance  of  the  corpor- 
ate society  of  the  school  with  the  knowledge  of  each  class  and  of 
each  boy  in  it.  A  Church  ruler  can  be  really  great  only  when, 
in  forming  wide  conceptions  and  plans,  he  is  also  alive  to  the 
details,  and  the  training,  in  countless  ways,  of  the  persons  needed 
for  their  realization.  Great  commanders  such  as  Wellington, 
Napoleon,  von  Moltke,  or  Roberts,  have  held  in  combination  the 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  251 

plan  of  great  campaigns  with  concentration  of  attention  to 
smallest  contingencies  and  details,  and,  in  one  case  at  least,  to 
the  welfare,  moral,  and  spiritual,  of  the  soldiers  under  their  com- 
mand. If  that  combination  exists  in  the  highest  forms  of  human 
action,  need  we  hesitate  to  believe  that  it  also  characterizes 
the  all-sovereign  action  of  God  Himself  ?  Not  trustfully  only, 
but  also  reasonably,  we  may  say  with  the  Psalmist : — 

"  The  Lord  doth  build  up  Jerusalem ; 

He  gathereth  together  the  outcasts  of  Israel. 

He  healeth  the  broken  in  heart, 

And  bindeth  up  their  wounds. 

He  telleth  the  number  of  the  stars  ; 

He  giveth  them  all  their  names. 

Great  is  our  Lord,  and  mighty  in  power  ; 

His  understanding  is  infinite." 

IF  A  controversy  on  this  difficulty  took  place  in  the  Hibbert 
Journal  recently.  In  an  article  on  Prayer,  Mr.  Charles  Stewart 
asked :  "  Can  it  rationally  be  supposed  that  the  prayers,  made 
daily  and  hourly  by  hundreds  of  millions  of  human  beings  of  one 
religion  and  another,  addressed  to  their  deity,  true  or  false,  asking 
for  all  manner  of  things,  wise  and  unwise,  selfish  and  unselfish, 
can  reach  the  ears  of  God,  or  that  they  deserve  to  do  so,  a  very 
large  proportion  of  them  being  merely  formal,  perfunctory,  in- 
sincere, or  misdirected  ?  Considering  the  incalculable  amount  of 
weighing  and  sifting  which  these  petitions  must  require,  the 
wide  and  constant  knowledge  and  observation  of  the  bodily 
circumstances  and  mental  conditions  of  each  suppliant  which 
must  be  presupposed  in  God  if  the  petitions  are  to  be  dealt 
with  judicially  and  fairly  (and  any  other  idea  is  incompatible 
with  Divine  justice),  can  it  be  conceived  that  God  can  give 
serious  ear  and  individual  consideration  to  each  and  all  of 
them  ? " 

Bishop  D'Arcy  replied :  "  Mr.  Stewart  seems  to  imagine  that 
the  amount  of  '  weighing  and  sifting  which  these  petitions  must 
require  '  is  too  complicated  a  problem  for  the  Deity.  He  thinks 
it  more  probable  that  they  are  dealt  with  according  to  general 
laws.  But  surely  this  is  an  amazingly  petty  view  of  the  Divine 
Nature.  How  infinitely  worthier  is  the  teaching  that  not  a 
sparrow  falls  to  the  ground  without  God's  knowledge  and  care  ! 
It  is  more  philosophical  also.  To  imagine,  as  Mr.  Stewart  does, 
that  God's  interest  in  His  universe  is  entirely  concerned  with 
general  laws,  is  a  deification  of  red  tape.     The  truth  is  that,  in 


252     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

the  actual  world,  reality  is  always  concrete  and  individual.     The 
law  is  a  mere  abstraction."  ^ 

•T  The  avocations  of  God,  however  manifold,  do  not  hinder 
Him  in  the  least  from  bestowing  as  much  attention  upon  this 
earth  as  if  He  had  nothing  else  to  attend  to  ;  and  to  suppose  the 
contrary  is  to  transfer  to  Him  the  ideas  and  attributes  of  a 
limited  creature.  If  we  judge  from  the  fine  balance  which  there 
is  between  the  necessities  of  nature  and  the  supplies  of  Provid- 
ence— the  rare  occurrence  of  famine  or  starvation  upon  the  earth, 
and  the  ample  means  of  meeting  these  occurrences  by  prudent 
foresight  and  proper  economy — from  the  adaptation  of  every 
creature  to  its  abode,  and  of  the  productions  of  the  region  to  its 
wants,  and  in  general  from  God's  being  so  ready  even  much  be- 
forehand with  His  gifts  to  man  and  beast,  we  shall,  instead  of 
concluding  against  a  similar  intercourse  between  the  Creator  and 
the  creature  in  things  religious,  conclude  that  here  also  there 
should  be  a  correspondence  of  want  and  of  supply,  of  request  and 
of  gift.  It  is  very  well,  therefore,  for  men  who  have  made  a  few 
advances  into  the  knowledge  of  the  universe,  to  conjecture  from 
its  ample  population  that  the  Creator  has  not  time  to  attend  to 
our  little  wants,  when  it  is  the  universal  acknowledgment  of  the 
learned,  that  the  least  microscopic  insect  is  as  richly  furnished 
with  organic  structures  and  beautiful  adaptation  to  its  birthplace 
and  habitation,  as  if  the  Almighty  had  occupied  His  faculties 
upon  that  invisible  creature  alone.- 

IV. 

A  Perfect  Providence. 

1.  A  more  serious  difficulty  has  now  to  be  dealt  with.  If  God 
knows  all,  and  does  all  for  the  best,  may  we  not  trust  to  His 
guidance  at  least  as  much  as  we  do  to  the  guidance  of  men  ?  And 
if  "  prayer  moves  the  hand  that  guides  the  world,"  what  are  we 
that  we  should  grasp  at  the  rein  in  the  hand  of  the  skilful  driver  ? 
But  it  may  be  said  in  answer,  first  of  all,  that  prayer  changes  the 
conditions;  God  causes  the  grain  in  the  field  to  grow  and  ripen, 
but  man  plants  the  field  and  chooses  what  kind  of  grain  it  shall 
bear.  Petition  is  of  three  kinds  :  the  prayer  for  spiritual  bless- 
ings for  ourselves,  the  prayer  for  spiritual  blessings  for  others, 
and  the  prayer  for  material  blessings,  for  ourselves  or  others. 

1  The  Hibbert  Journal,  ix.  660. 

^  Tlie  Collected  Writingi  of  Ed%oard  Irving,  iii.  3. 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS         253 

(1)  The  first  kind  of  petition,  the  prayer  for  spiritual  bless- 
ings for  ourselves,  we  may  recognize  as  distinctly  a  condition  to 
the  end  desired  ;  it  is  the  opening  of  the  heart,  the  natural  method 
by  which  the  gift  may  be  received.  From  the  point  of  view  of 
the  understanding,  prayer  must  inevitably  be  its  own  answer, 
for  when  the  heart  is  ready  for  good,  good  must  enter  as  it  were 
by  a  certain  Divine  necessity.  But  if  we  grant  the  truth  of 
religion,  this  sort  of  petition  and  its  fulfilment  appear  in  a  higher 
aspect.  The  response  of  spirit  to  spirit  may  indeed  be  as  inevit- 
able as  any  action  and  reaction  in  the  natural  world,  but  the 
method  is  different.  Because  the  response  is  regular,  it  is  not 
therefore  mechanical.     The  spiritual  acts  voluntarily. 

(2)  The  question  is  somewhat  harder  when  we  turn  to  the 
petition  for  spiritual  blessings  for  others.  God  must  know  their 
needs ;  it  is  the  human  spirit,  not  the  Divine,  that  requires  to 
be  prompted ;  and  such  petition  is  not  obviously  a  condition  of 
the  fulfilment  of  that  which  is  desired.  Our  truest  spiritual  life 
leads  us  to  pray  for  others.  We  may  explain  this  as  justified 
simply  by  the  effect  which  the  intense  thought  and  feeling  of  one 
person  has  upon  another.  But  is  there  not  more  ?  Is  it  not  true 
that  as  the  mother  gives  utterance  in  prayer  to  her  longing  for 
her  child's  good,  her  heart  is  opened,  so  that  the  influence  which 
she  exerts  upon  the  child  becomes  not  merely  that  of  her  own 
desire  and  will,  but  also  that  of  the  Divine  Presence  itself  ?  The 
bit  of  steel  that  is  charged  by  a  magnet  becomes  powerful  to 
charge  other  bits  of  steel.  In  such  petition  what  we  have  is  not 
the  human  will  making  the  Divine  will  follow  its  desire,  but  the 
Divine  will  making  the  human  will  its  instrument. 

IF  Certainly  no  one  prays  for  anything  unless  he  believes  that 
it  exists,  and  hopes  to  obtain  it.  But  God  wills  that  what  He 
has  promised  should  be  asked  of  Him  in  prayer.  And  perhaps 
therefore  He  in  the  first  place  promises  many  things  which  He 
has  resolved  to  give  us,  that  our  devotion  may  be  excited  by  the 
promise :  and  that  thus  our  earnest  prayer  may  merit  what  He 
had  been  disposed  to  bestow  upon  us  freely. ^ 

(3)  In  the  prayer  for  material  blessings,  whether  for  ourselves 
or  for  others,  the  connexion  between  the  petition  and  the  fulfil- 
ment is  far  less  obvious.     All  the  tests  that  have  been  suggested 

^  St.  Bernard,  Works  (ed.  Eales),  iii.  345. 


254    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

are  very  superficial.  Thus  Tyndall  proposed,  as  a  prayer-gauge 
by  which  the  petition  for  material  blessing  should  be  submitted 
to  scientific  test,  that  two  wards  should  be  set  apart  in  a  hospital, 
in  one  of  which  the  patients  should  be  treated  by  physicians  in 
the  usual  way,  while  in  the  other  ward  they  should  simply  be 
prayed  for.  But  Tyndall  here  fell  into  an  error  common  with 
scientists  when  dealing  with  questions  of  religion  or  metaphysics. 
He  did  not  recognize  the  spiritual  nature  of  prayer,  and  failed  to 
see  that  in  this  experiment  that  he  proposed  the  conditions  would 
be  such  that  the  prayer  offered  would  not  be  prayer  at  all.  It 
would  not  be  the  expression  of  personal  desire,  but  the  demand 
that  God  should  display  His  power.  The  fact  is  that  there  is  no 
test  that  can  be  applied.  The  question  is  not  whether  prayer 
is  a  good  irrigator  or  fertilizer,  but  whether  it  is  a  real  power. 
If  a  man  believes  that  it  is,  then  let  him  pray  as  he  wishes, 
spontaneously  and  freely. 

Oft  I  think  my  prayers 
Are  foolish,  feeble  things  ;  for  Christ  is  good 
Whether  I  pray  or  not  .  ,  .  and  then  I  stop 
And  feel  I  can  do  nought  towards  helping  men, 
Till  out  it  comes,  like  tears  that  will  not  hold, 
And  I  must  pray  again  for  all  the  world. 

2.  No  doubt  it  is  the  judgment  of  reason,  as  it  is  again  the 
assurance  of  our  Lord,  that  our  Father  knoweth  what  things  we 
have  need  of,  before  we  ask  Him,  and  knows  them  a  great  deal 
better  than  we  do.  The  object  of  prayer  is  not  to  inform  God 
or  to  correct  His  methods — to  drag  down  His  wisdom  to  the 
level  of  our  folly ;  the  object  of  prayer  is  to  educate  us  in  inter- 
course with  God.  We  are  sons  of  God,  capable  of  something 
better  than  mechanical  obedience;  capable  of  intelligent  corre- 
spondence with  our  Father,  capable  of  fellowship  and  communion 
with  Him  in  one  Spirit.  There  is  to  be  what  the  New  Testa- 
ment calls  "  freedom  of  speech,"  and  an  open  avenue  of  "  inquiry 
towards  God ".  That  is  our  highest  function ;  and  that  is  the 
glory  of  our  eternal  occupation.  To  train  us  for  it  now,  in  the 
childhood  of  our  immortal  life,  even  though  we  babble  with  half- 
inarticulate  sounds,  we  are  to  be  practised  to  pray.  We  are  to 
ask  persistently  and  regularly,  and  according  to  the  loving  wisdom 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  255 

of  God,  to  receive  in  response   to  our  prayers,  and  so  to  be 
educated  into  personal  relations  with  God. 

What  if  God  knows  prayer  to  be  the  thing  we  need  tirst  and 
most?  What  if  the  main  object  in  His  idea  of  prayer  be  the 
supplying  of  our  great,  our  endless  need — the  need  of  Himself  ? 
What  if  the  good  of  all  our  smaller  and  lower  needs  lies  in  this, 
that  they  help  to  drive  us  to  God  ?  Hunger  may  drive  the 
runaway  child  home,  and  he  may  or  may  not  be  fed  at  once,  but 
he  needs  his  mother  more  than  his  dinner.  Communion  with 
God  is  the  one  need  of  the  soul  beyond  all  other  needs ;  prayer 
is  the  beginning  of  that  communion  and  some  need  is  the  motive 
of  that  prayer.  Our  wants  are  for  the  sake  of  our  coming  into 
communion  with  God,  our  eternal  need.  If  gratitude  and  love 
immediately  followed  the  supply  of  our  needs,  if  God  our 
Saviour  were  the  one  thought  of  our  hearts,  then  it  might  be  un- 
necessary that  we  should  ask  for  anything  we  need.  But  seeing 
we  take  our  supplies  as  a  matter  of  course,  feeling  as  if  they 
came  out  of  nothing,  or  from  the  earth,  or  our  own  thoughts, 
instead  of  out  of  a  heart  of  love  and  a  will  which  alone  is  force, 
it  is  needful  that  we  should  be  made  to  feel  some  at  least  of  our 
wants,  that  we  may  seek  Him  who  alone  supplies  all  of  them, 
and  find  His  every  gift  a  window  to  His  heart  of  truth.  So 
begins  a  communion,  a  talking  with  God,  a  coming-to-one  with 
Him,  which  is  the  sole  end  of  prayer,  and  even  of  existence  itself 
in  its  infinite  phases.  We  must  ask  that  we  may  receive ;  but 
that  we  should  receive  what  we  ask  in  respect  of  our  lower  needs 
is  not  God's  end  in  making  us  pray,  for  He  could  give  us  every- 
thing without  that.  To  bring  His  child  to  his  knee,  God  with- 
holds that  man  may  ask. 

IF  There  are  times  in  the  life  of  every  Christian  when  some 
great  truth  is  clearly  revealed  to  him,  some  long-locked  door  of 
promise  left  with  the  key  hanging  in  the  wards,  only  waiting  to 
be  turned  by  a  prayer.  At  these  times  God  is  waiting  to  be 
gracious,  and  what  He  appears  in  many  cases  to  wait  for  is  the 
full  consent  and  submission  of  the  human  will.  Often,  at  such 
times,  the  Holy  Spirit,  instructed  in  the  mind  and  will  of  God, 
will  allure  the  soul  into  the  direction  where  God  intends  to  meet 
and  bless  it.  The  life  will  be  drawn  towards  the  attainment  of 
some  specific  object,  the  heart  will  be  enticed  to  covet  earnestly 


J56     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

some  peculiar  grace ;  God  will  appear  to  invite  the  soul  to  pray 
for  the  especial  gift  He  intends  to  bestow.  "  Yet  for  this  thing," 
He  says,  speaking  of  some  boon  which  He  kept  in  store  for  His 
ancient  Church,  "  will  I  be  inquired  of  by  them."  God  sometimes 
seems  in  His  dealings  with  the  world  to  wait  till  He  has  secured 
the  co-operation  of  man's  wish  and  will.  "  Pray,"  says  our  Lord 
Himself,  "  to  the  Lord  of  the  harvest,  that  he  may  send  forth 
labourers  into  his  harvest."  The  harvest  is  God's,  and  it  is  He 
who  must  send  the  labourers  ;  still  man  must  pray.  His  great 
Father  worketh  not  alone ;  He  has  need  of  man's  voice,  man's 
heart,  man's  energy,  man's  prayer.^ 

3.  Experience  and  reason  contradict  the  assertion  that  God's 
best  gifts  can  be,  and  are,  given  to  us  apart  from  prayer.  This 
is  the  inveterate  fallacy  in  which  man  is  regarded  as  a  mechanism 
and  not  as  a  free  moral  and  spiritual  being.  To  the  creation,  in 
so  far  as  it  is  mechanical,  God  gives  its  complete  store  of  mechanical 
energy,  as  a  matter  of  course.  But  to  the  human  spirit  God  gives 
freedom,  and  in  that  freedom  the  power  of  appropriating  more  or 
less  of  the  Divine  benediction.  God  wills  to  give  His  best  gifts 
to  every  man,  but  He  is  able  to  do  so  only  in  so  far  as  man  re- 
sponds with  the  capacity  of  receiving  them.  Man's  moral  and 
spiritual  relations  with  God  are  relations  of  freedom.  The  will 
of  man  in  seeking  must  meet  the  will  of  God  in  giving.  They 
that  seek  shall  find.  The  Father  who  is  in  heaven  gives  "  good 
things  to  them  that  ask  him  ".  It  is  both  beautiful  and  true 
that  God's  best  gifts  come  to  man  in  answer  to  the  prayer  of 
faith. 

If  I  believe  all  successful  prayer  to  be  a  prompting  from  the 
Father.  My  prayer  does  not  change  His  mind ;  it  is  His  mind 
that  dictates  my  prayer.  Efficacious  prayer  is  not  so  much  a 
petition  as  a  prophecy ;  it  is  my  Father  saying  to  me,  *'  This  is 
My  will ;  ask  this  "? 

I  cannot  think  but  God  must  know 
About  the  thing  I  long  for  so ; 
I  know  He  is  so  good,  so  kind, 
I  cannot  think  but  He  will  find 
Some  way  to  help,  some  way  to  show 
Me  to  the  thing  I  long  for  so. 

*  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays^  143.         "*  George  MatheBon,  Bests  by  the  River,  68. 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS         257 

I  stretch  my  hand, — it  lies  so  near : 

It  looks  so  sweet,  it  looks  so  dear. 

"  Dear  Lord,"  I  pray,  "  oh,  let  me  know 

If  it  is  wrong  to  want  it  so  ". 

He  only  smiles, — He  does  not  speak ; 

My  heart  grows  weaker  and  more  weak, 

With  looking  at  the  thing  so  dear. 

Which  lies  so  far  and  yet  so  near. 

Now,  Lord,  I  leave  at  Thy  loved  feet 
This  thing  which  looks  so  near,  so  sweet, 
I  will  not  seek,  I  will  not  long, — 
I  almost  fear  I  have  been  wrong. 
I'll  go  and  work  the  harder,  Lord, 
And  wait  till  by  some  loud,  clear  word 
Thou  callest  me  to  Thy  loved  feet, 
To  take  this  thing,  so  dear,  so  sweet. ^ 

4.  The  more  we  approximate  to  the  prayer  of  faith,  the  more 
precise  the  answer  which  may  be  expected.  And  we  may  say 
that  it  is  the  prayer,  or  rather  the  spiritual  state  behind  the  prayer, 
that  makes  the  answer  possible.  Take,  for  instance,  the  case  of 
eager  Christian  men  and  women  who  pray  for  a  revival  of  re- 
ligion. After  a  season  of  earnest  waiting  upon  God,  a  revival  of 
religion  comes.  Apart  from  their  prayer,  it  never  could  have 
come.  For  God  works  through  right  human  media.  They,  by 
their  prayer,  were  bringing  themselves  into  that  spiritual  condi- 
tion, which  could  form  an  avenue  for  the  operations  of  the  Holy 
Ghost.  So  they,  praying,  received  from  God,  acting  through 
themselves,  that  for  which  they  prayed.  Thus  prayer  benefits 
him  who  prays.  It  also,  experience  teaches  us,  benefits  him  who 
is  prayed  for.  Very  strangely  sometimes,  the  prayer  of  a  mother 
protects  a  lad  that  is  far  away.  Men  may  remember  occasions 
when  they  have  felt  themselves  wondrously  guarded  from  evil. 
It  was  as  if  some  hand  unseen  was  laid  upon  them  to  hold  them 
back.  That  hand  was  the  hand  of  God.  Maybe,  at  the  other 
end  of  the  chain  of  causes  was  the  silent  prayer  of  a  tender  heart 
that  loved  much.  It  is  reasonable  to  hold  that  prayer  is  answered, 
alongside  of  a  belief  in  a  changelessly  wise  and  loving  God.  For 
earnest  prayer  is  an  indication  of  a  changed  situation  in  ourselves 

^  Saze  Holm. 
17 


258    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

which  demands  a  changed  experience  from  Him,  who,  with  His 
wisdom  and  power,  continually  adjusts  the  universe  to  His  own 
great  ends. 

IT  Jesus  was  convinced  that  abundant  life,  volitional,  mental, 
and  physical,  proceeded  from  the  Father's  will  always,  toward  all 
human  creatures;  that  this  flood  of  life,  falling  like  sunshine, 
needed  but  the  opening  of  the  window  in  man's  understanding, 
the  will  to  estimate  God  aright,  the  will  to  pray,  the  will  to  be- 
lieve. Man  can  only  shut  God  out ;  when  man's  heart  is  open 
the  influx  of  Divine  life  is  sure  according  to  the  ever-active  pur- 
pose of  God.^ 

IF  "It's  a  strange  thing,"  said  Dinah  Morris,  "  sometimes  when 
I'm  quite  alone,  sitting  in  my  room  with  my  eyes  closed,  or 
walking  over  the  hills,  the  people  I've  seen  and  known,  if  it's 
only  been  for  a  few  days,  are  brought  before  me,  and  I  hear  their 
voices  and  see  them  look  and  move  almost  plainer  than  I  ever  did 
when  they  were  really  with  me  so  as  I  could  touch  them.  And 
then  my  heart  is  drawn  out  towards  them,  and  I  feel  their  lot 
as  if  it  was  my  own,  and  I  take  comfort  in  spreading  it  before 
the  Lord  and  resting  in  His  Love,  on  their  behalf  as  well  as  my 


own. 


IF  When  rector  of  Kilmoylan  and  Cummer,  William  Plunket 
was  moved  to  devote  himself  to  the  cause  of  Irish  Church  Missions  ; 
and  in  a  pamphlet  that  he  wrote  describing  the  work  in  West 
Connaught,  he  gives  the  following  striking  instance  of  the  effect 
of  continued  intercessory  prayer  : — 

"  The  owner  of  Clifden  five-and-twenty  years  ago  lived  in  a 
beautiful  place  adjoining  the  town,  in  a  castle  which  overlooked 
the  inlet  of  the  Atlantic  beside  which  Clifden  is  situated.  He  was 
a  strictly  upright,  fearless,  and  amiable  man,  much  beloved  and 
respected  by  the  people  ;  but  he  was  more :  he  was  a  pious  and 
consistent  Christian,  and  it  grieved  his  soul,  day  by  day,  to  see 
the  fearful  state  of  spiritual  destitution  in  the  midst  of  which  he 
lived.  At  last  he  and  his  brother,  a  man  of  like  spirit,  adopted 
the  only  alternative  which  at  the  time  seemed  open  to  them  ;  they 
resolved  to  pray.  Five-and-twenty  years  ago,  upon  a  Friday 
evening,  they  with  three  or  four  friends  established  a  weekly 
prayer-meeting.  That  weekly  prayer-meeting  has  never  been 
discontinued.  For  ten  or  twelve  years  the  prayers  of  those  few 
suppliants  went  up  to  God,  entreating  Him  to  pour  down  a  bless- 
ing upon  the  surrounding  neighbourhood ;   and  yet  no  answer 

1  Christus  Futurus,  60.  ^  George  Eliot,  Adam  Bede, 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS  259 

seemed  to  come.  In  God's  good  time,  however,  the  little  cloud 
was  seen ;  by  degrees  the  heavens  became  full  of  impending 
blessings,  and  at  last  the  shower  descended.  And  now  in  that 
same  district  of  West  Galway,  where  five-and-twenty  years  ago 
there  was  but  this  one  small  church,  with  its  twenty  or  thirty 
worshippers,  there  are  now  no  less  than  twenty-five  congregations, 
ten  of  which  meet  in  churches ;  and  one  of  these  is  the  large  new 
church  of  Clifden,  in  which  every  Sunday  there  is  a  congregation 
of  about  three  hundred  worshippers  ".^ 

V. 

The  Unchangeable  Will. 

The  last  of  the  philosophical  arguments  against  prayer  is  that 
prayer  is  inconsistent  with  the  truth  that  all  which  comes  to  pass 
is  predetermined  in  the  predestination  of  God.  Unless  the  will 
of  God  could  have  been,  or  could  be,  other  than  it  is,  what  room 
is  there  for  the  effect  of  prayer  ? 

1.  The  objection  carries  us  into  the  old  controversy  between 
the  defenders  of  the  Divine  foreknowledge  and  Divine  sovereignty 
on  the  one  hand,  and  the  defenders  of  the  freedom  of  the  human 
will  on  the  other.  With  the  comprehensive  breadth  characteristic 
of  perfect  truth,  the  reality  of  both,  alike  in  the  Old  Testament 
and  in  the  New,  is  assumed.  Simply  from  the  fact  of  that  breadth 
of  treatment,  men  might  indeed  have  learned  that,  in  our  own 
acceptance  of  both  these  facts,  there  was  nothing  to  harmonize, 
because  between  the  two  there  is,  in  reality,  no  conflict,  and  many 
a  subtle  intellect  might  have  saved  itself  much  painful  effort  and 
disappointment.  On  the  one  side,  the  house  of  Israel  is  "  as  the 
clay  in  the  potter's  hand  "  ;  on  the  other,  "  at  what  instant "  God 
"shall  speak  concerning  a  nation,  and  concerning  a  kingdom," 
His  attitude  towards  it  is  contingent  on  the  nation  "  turning  from 
their  evil,"  or  "  doing  evil  in  his  sight ". 

If  we  cannot  reconcile  the  two  facts  of  eternal  predestination 
and  of  the  power  of  prayer,  we  must  not  for  that  reason  overlook 
either.  On  the  one  hand,  we  shall  become  heartless  and  hopeless 
unless  we  firmly  believe  that  "  through  the  ages  one  increasing 
purpose  runs,"  a  purpose  which  will  work  itself  out  independently 

^  F.  D.  How,  Archbishop  Plunket :  A  Memoir^  45. 


26o   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

of  us,  a  purpose  of  love  which  has  in  long  ages  past  settled  what 
shall  take  place,  and  to  what  it  will  lead.  And,  on  the  other  hand, 
we  shall  become  lifeless  and  formal  atheists  unless  we  allow  that 
our  prayers  can  and  do  have  an  effect  in  the  world,  that  events 
are  moulded  according  to  our  requests,  that  God  does  hear  and 
answer  the  supplications  of  His  people. 

2.  Wherever  a  moral  government  of  the  world  is  acknowledged, 
it  must  be  likewise  acknowledged  that  the  Divine  purpose  is  no 
fate,  no  inflexible  allotment,  but  a  purpose  which  in  its  execution 
is  conditioned  by  the  free  actions  of  men,  a  pre-supposition  with- 
out which  the  conceptions  of  imputation  and  responsibility,  of 
being  lost  and  saved,  of  judgment  and  mercy,  of  faith  and  con- 
version, would  be  without  all  sense  and  meaning.  But  of  the 
human  actions,  the  free  acts  of  men,  by  which  the  Divine  purpose 
is  self-conditioned,  and  which  it  has  ordained  as  conditions  for 
the  development  of  God's  Kingdom  in  the  human  race,  prayer 
also  is  one. 

Whether  I  open  my  mouth  or  lift  my  hand  is,  before  my  doing 
it,  strictly  within  the  jurisdiction  and  power  of  my  personal  will ; 
but,  however  I  may  decide,  my  decision,  so  absolutely  free  to  me, 
will  have  been  already  incorporated  by  the  All-seeing,  All-con- 
trolling Being  as  an  integral  part,  however  insignificant,  of  His 
one  all-embracing  purpose,  leading  on  to  effects  and  causes  beyond 
itself.  Prayer  too  is  only  a  foreseen  action  of  man  which,  together 
with  its  results,  is  embraced  in  the  eternal  predestination  of  God. 
To  us  this  or  that  blessing  may  be  strictly  contingent  on  our 
praying  for  it ;  but  our  prayer  is  nevertheless  so  far  from  neces- 
sarily introducing  change  into  the  purpose  of  the  Unchangeable 
that  it  has  been  all  along  taken,  so  to  speak,  into  account  by  Him. 
If  then,  with  "  the  Father  of  lights  "  there  is  in  this  sense  "  no 
variableness,  neither  shadow  of  turning,"  it  is  not  therefore 
irrational  to  pray  for  specific  blessings,  because  God  works  out 
His  plans  not  merely  in  us  but  by  us ;  and  we  may  dare  to  say 
that  that  which  is  to  us  a  free  self-determination,  may  be  not 
other  than  a  foreseen  element  of  His  work. 

IF  Prayer  has  always  to  do  with  the  relation  between  our  aims 
and  God's  eternal  aim,  between  our  will  and  God's  will.  What- 
ever we  pray  for  (and  we  may  pray  for  even  the  smallest  earthly 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS         261 

things  that  are  really  dear  to  us)  must  have  reference  to  our 
highest  aim,  which  is  included  in  God's  eternal  purpose.  Other- 
wise our  prayer  is  not  Christian ;  we  cannot  pray  with  the  firm 
assurance  of  being  heard,  we  do  not  have  the  promise  that  what 
we  ask  will  be  given  us  by  the  Father  in  heaven.* 

IF  Nothing  can  alter  God's  grace,  His  will  in  that  sense,  His 
large  will  and  final  purpose — our  racial  blessing,  our  salvation,  our 
redemption  in  Jesus  Christ.  But  He  is  an  infinite  opportunist. 
His  ways  are  flexible.  His  intentions  are  amenable  to  us  if  His 
will  is  changeless.  The  steps  of  His  process  are  variable  according 
to  our  freedom  and  His.^ 

3.  For  God's  will,  which  we  pray  may  be  done,  is,  after  all, 
no  impersonal  law.  It  is  the  will  of  a  personal  Being  who  in  the 
secret  chamber  of  our  soul  reasons,  expostulates,  explains,  warns, 
guides,  attracts  us  to  Himself.  And  this  is  the  thought  that 
may  best  sustain  us  to  pray  and  not  to  faint.  If  we  are  created 
to  seek  intercourse  with  God,  it  is  because  He  so  created  us,  or, 
in  other  words,  because  He  first  desired  intercourse  with  us,  and 
therefore  endowed  us  with  its  capacity.  It  is  an  attribute  of 
our  creation,  and  therefore  a  purpose  of  our  Creator.  And  as 
Christians  we  know,  what  even  as  men  we  could  not  but  hope, 
that  the  purposes  of  our  creation  are  purposes  of  love,  and  that 
our  every  effort  to  fulfil  them  will  be  more  than  met  by  Him 
who  first  loved  us  and  gave  Himself  for  us,  and  who  has  left  us 
the  picture  of  the  father  who,  when  his  sinful  son  was  a  great 
way  off",  saw  him,  and  had  compassion  on  him,  and  ran,  and  fell 
on  his  neck,  and  kissed  him. 

IT  Above  the  thought  that  we  are  known,  with  all  its  awful- 
ness,  towers  the  thought  that,  despite  that  knowledge,  we  are  also 
loved — loved  through  all  the  disguises  that  conceal  us  from  our- 
selves or  others  ;  loved  through  all  our  temptations,  our  sorrows, 
our  sins  ;  loved  through  all  our  ineffectual  wanderings  away  from 
love  ;  loved  with  a  love  which,  because  it  is  all  holy,  must  at 
times  appear  to  sinners  strangely,  imperiously  stern ;  but  all  the 
while  desires  to  have  fuller  fellowship  with  us  in  prayer,  and  to 
say  to  us  at  the  last,  "  Ask,  and  ye  shall  receive,  that  your  joy 
may  be  full  ".^ 

1  J.  Kaftan,  Die  Christliche  Lehre  vom  Oebet,  14. 

2  P.  T.  Forsyth,  in  The  London  Quarterly  Review,  July  1908,  p.  13. 
'J.  R.  Illingworth,  University  and  Cathedral  Sermons,  179. 


262    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  To  our  idea  of  God  moral  fixity  and  perfection  are  needful ; 
but  He,  **  with  whom  there  can  be  no  variation,  neither  shadow 
that  is  cast  by  tm-ning,"  is  a  personal  Being  who  acts  by  a  law 
of  love.  He  is  "  the  Father  of  lights  "  from  whom  "  every  good 
gift  and  every  perfect  boon  "  comes  down,  and  of  such  an  One 
we  are  encouraged  to  *'ask  in  faith,  nothing  doubting".  His 
predestination  is  a  predestination  in  love,  and,  obviously,  love 
offers  itself  to  a  free  response.  Beyond  all  our  finite  limitations 
of  time,  He  has  foreseen  actions  as  well  as  prayers  which  to  us 
are,  at  the  moment,  perfectly  spontaneous ;  they  are  already 
included  as  factors  and  causes  working  out  that  final  result  which, 
beygnd  all  dispute  is  "on  a  line  with  the  good  pleasure  of  His 
will  ".1 

II  God's  unchangeableness  is  the  very  foundation  of  desire, 
and  hope,  and  activity,  in  things  religious  as  in  things  natural. 
The  uniformity  of  nature's  operations  in  the  one,  and  the  con- 
stancy of  God's  promises  in  the  other,  give  aim  and  calculation 
and  certainty  to  events  ;  God's  promises  being  so  many  pledges 
of  His  procedure,  upon  the  immutability  of  which  the  Christian 
conceives  hope  and  anticipation,  and  waits  for  accomplishment. 
It  is  His  unchangeableness  that  gives  confidence  so  soon  as  you 
know  what  His  purposes  are.  Of  these  purposes  the  Scripture 
is  the  record.  They  are  laws  like  those  of  the  Medes  and  Persians, 
which  alter  not,  and  their  fulfilment  may  be  built  on  as  securely 
as  the  rising  of  the  sun,  or  the  revolution  of  the  heavens,  or  the 
most  stable  of  nature's  courses.^ 

4.  But  another  difficulty  here  arises.  It  is  obvious  that  any 
doctrine  of  the  efficacy  of  prayer  must  maintain  that  God  will  do 
for  a  suppliant  something  which  He  will  not  do  for  one  who  does 
not  supplicate.  Is  not  this  inconsistent  with  the  unchangeable- 
ness, not  merely  of  the  Divine  predestination,  but  also  of  the 
innermost  character,  as  determined  by  His  essence,  of  God  Him- 
self ?  Do  we  not  imply  that  He  acts  under  the  influence  of 
emotion  ?  May  we  not,  unconsciously,  but  none  the  less  really, 
attribute  weakness  to  Him  ? 

The  answer  is  that,  unless  there  is  a  deeply  rooted  disunion 
between  the  character  of  the  Creator  and  the  creature,  there  must 
be  in  Him  a  true  emotion ;  for  even  in  our  own  personality  we 
are  convinced  that  the  constituent  elements  are  not  reason  and 

1  A.  J.  Worlledge,  Prayer,  58. 

'  The  Collected  Writings  of  Edward  Irving^  iii.  4. 


PHILOSOPHICAL  OBJECTIONS         263 

will  only,  but  also  love.  It  would,  indeed,  be  a  moral  weakness 
in  a  parent  always  to  yield  to  a  child's  wayward  wish,  however 
injurious  to  his  own  purpose  of  love  and  to  the  child's  highest 
interests  the  wish  might  be.  But  it  would  be  the  gravest  of  all 
moral  defects  if  there  were  no  desire  in  the  parent's  heart  to 
grant,  if  possible,  the  child's  requests,  especially  when  the  child 
reposed  in  him  an  absolute  trust,  expressed  by  his  petition,  con- 
fident in  the  conviction  that  the  will  of  father  and  child  were 
one. 

IF  This  doctrine  of  Providence  is  by  no  means  free  from 
difficulties  ;  but  it  avoids  the  difficulties  that  beset  the  doctrine 
of  predestination.  God  is  not  moving  men  like  pieces  on  a  chess- 
board, but  is  exerting  over  them,  as  free,  the  guidance  to  which 
as  a  good  God  He  is  entitled.  So  long  as  He  treats  them  as  the 
free  and  responsible  beings  that  they  are,  who  can  object  to  His 
ruling  their  life  in  the  interest  of  His  own  gracious  and  holy 
purpose  ?  These  statements  do  not  remove  mystery  from  Provi- 
dence ;  but  they  justify  confidence  in  such  a  Providence  as  the 
Christian  revelation  sets  forth — a  care  and  direction  universal, 
paternal  in  spirit,  holy  in  aim,  wise  in  administration,  spiritual  in 
quality,  educative  in  purpose,  looking  ever  to  the  good,  and  using 
natural  means  along  with  spiritual  as  agencies  helpful  to  spiritual 
ends.^ 

IF  The  conception  of  prayer  as  a  means  of  influencing  an  un- 
willing God  to  do  that  which  He  would  not  otherwise  have  done 
rests  on  a  theory  of  the  relation  of  the  Divine  will  to  the  human 
which  is  equally  unsatisfactory  to  ethics  and  to  religion.  The 
true  conception  of  prayer  is  that  it  opens  the  way  for  the  im- 
partation  of  the  Divine  blessings  by  providing  the  necessary 
condition  of  their  bestowal,  and  this  all  along  the  line.^ 

IF  It  is  irreverent,  they  say,  to  express  a  wish  rising  out  of 
the  narrowness  of  our  intellect  and  heart,  about  something  which 
His  decree  has  long  ago  settled  ;  it  is  an  ill-timed  curiosity  to  say, 
I  wish  it  might  be  so  and  so,  when  we  shall  presently  learn  how 
He  has  willed  it.  Do  not  be  perplexed  by  such  words.  Christ 
did  it,  therefore  we,  too,  may  do  it.  It  is  one  of  the  privileges 
that  belong  to  our  position  as  children  of  God.^ 

^  W.  N.  Clarke,  An  Outline  of  Christian  Theology,  152. 
^  W.  Adams  Brown,  Christian  TJieology  in  Outline^  385. 
'  F.  B.  Schleiermaoher,  Sermons,  41. 


XIII. 
The  Value  of  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Ainsworth,  P.  C,  The  Threshold  Grace. 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H,,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 
Biederwolf,  W.  E.,  How  Can  God  Answer  Prayer  ?  (1913). 
Bounds,  E.  M.,  Purpose  in  Prayer  (1914). 
Cornaby,  W.  A.,  Prayer  and  the  Human  Problem  (1912). 
Diggle,  J.  W.,  Sermons  for  Daily  Life  (1891). 
Dudden,  F.  H.,  Christ  and  Christ's  Religion  (1910). 
Gordon,  S.  D.,  The  Quiet  Time. 
Greenwell,  Dora,  Essays  (1867). 
Horton,  R.  F.,  My  Belief  (1908). 
How,  W.  W.,  Plain  Words,  iv.  (1901). 
Liddon,  H.  P.,  Some  Elements  of  Religion  (1873). 
McComb,  S.,  Prayer :  WJiat  it  Is  and  Wliat  it  Does  (1913). 
McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 
Mclutyre,  D.  M.,  Waymarks  in  the  P^irsuit  of  God  (1908). 
Moore,  D.,  Aids  to  Prayer  (1868). 
Murray,  A.,  The  Mystery  of  the  True  Vine  (1898). 
Roberts,  J.  E.,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions  (1908). 
Stevens,  G.  B.,  Doctrine  and  Life  (1895). 
Tailing,  M.  P.,  Extempore  Prayer  (1902). 
Thomas,  W.  H.  G.,  in  iVestminster  Bible  Conference  (1912). 
Vaughan,  C.  J.,  Voices  of  the  Prophets  (1867). 
Waterhouse,  E.  S.,  The  Psychology  of  the  Christian  Life  (1913). 
Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 

American  Journal   of  Religious  Psychology  and  Education,  iv.  (1910)  65 
(J.  B.  Pratt). 


266 


The  Value  of  Prayer. 

1.  What  can  prayer  do  for  us  ?  What  can  it  effect  ?  What  is  its 
positive  value  and  significance  ?  For  there  cannot  be  a  doubt 
that  in  some  way  or  another  prayer  is  power.  The  greatest  men 
of  history  have  been  men  of  prayer.  The  most  spiritual  men,  the 
prophets  and  saints  and  reformers,  have  been  precisely  those  who 
were  most  instant  and  active  in  prayer.  Our  Lord  Himself 
could  not  dispense  with  prayer.  And  all  alike,  knowing  what 
prayer  had  actually  wrought  in  their  personal  experience,  bear 
witness  to  its  wonder-working  force  for  the  ennoblement  of  life. 
They  tell  us  that  prayer  is  power,  that  prayer  is  victory.  They 
tell  us  that,  whatever  else  we  leave  undone,  we  must  not  leave 
this  undone.  They  tell  us  that  all  is  lost  unless  we  pay  attention 
to  it.  Our  whole  effectiveness  in  the  last  resort  depends  on  our 
intercourse  with  God  and  the  unseen  world  of  God  in  prayer. 

IF  I  have  intimated  my  fear  that  it  is  visionary  to  expect  an 
unusual  success  in  the  human  administration  of  religion  unless 
there  are  unusual  omens  :  now  a  most  emphatical  spirit  of  prayer 
would  be  such  an  omen ;  and  the  individual  who  should  deter- 
mine to  try  its  last  possible  efiicacy  might  probably  find  himself 
becoming  a  much  more  prevailing  agent  in  his  little  sphere. 
And  if  the  whole,  or  the  greater  number,  of  the  disciples  of 
Christianity  were  with  an  earnest  and  unalterable  resolution  of 
each  to  combine  that  heaven  should  not  withhold  one  single 
influence  which  the  very  utmost  effort  of  conspiring  and  per- 
severing supplication  would  obtain,  it  would  be  a  sign  that  a 
revolution  of  the  world  was  at  hand.^ 

2.  The  question  formerly  so  much  debated,  "  Are  the  effects 
of  prayer  merely  subjective,  or  are  they  objective  as  well  ? "  has 
assumed  a  new  form.  The  truth  is  that  the  subjective  and  the 
objective  cannot  be  separated,  as  though  the  material  world  were  a 
closed  circle,  whereas,  as  all  the  higher  thought  of  our  time  assures 

1  John  Foster. 
267 


268    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

US,  it  is  penetrated  through  and  through  by  spirit ;  and  more 
especially  is  this  true  of  the  matter  which  in  our  physical  organism 
lies  closest  to  human  consciousness.  Prayer  creates  the  new  self, 
but  the  new  self  does  not  live  in  a  vacuum.  It  in  turn  creates 
the  new  environment  as  regards  both  the  physical  organism  and 
the  world  around ;  and  thus  it  comes  about  that  objective  changes 
take  place  which  would  not  have  taken  place  but  for  the  interven- 
tion of  the  spiritual  state  induced  by  prayer. 

IF  Prayer  is  a  reasonable  service,  in  which  both  heart  and 
mind  can  participate.  It  is  neither  a  mere  act  of  obedience,  nor 
a  sort  of  work  of  supererogation,  in  which  we  may  or  may  not 
participate  according  to  our  passing  inclination.  It  is  a  holy 
activity  of  the  soul,  carrying  a  double  blessing  with  it — blessed 
in  itself  as  one  of  the  loftiest  functions  of  the  human  spirit,  and 
blessed  in  its  consequences,  some  of  them  direct  and  palpable,  and 
some  of  them  reaching  far  beyond  our  fondest  dreams  into  the 
wealth  of  ultimate  benediction.^ 

Let  us  look  at  the  value  of  prayer : — 

I.  For  Deliverance. 
II.  For  Character. 
III.  For  Power. 


Deliverance. 

The  life  that  in  prayer  habitually  lets  itself  be  searched  by 
the  Divine  gaze  cannot  continue  in  conscious,  deliberate  sin.  As 
some  one  has  said,  either  the  sin  will  kill  the  prayer  or  the  prayer 
the  sin.  The  purifying  influence  of  sincere  prayer  is  undeniable. 
One  cannot  court  temptation  who  has  earnestly  prayed  that  he 
be  not  led  into  it :  he  cannot  pamper  his  baser  nature  if  he  has 
prayed  for  deliverance  from  evil  In  the  world  into  which  his 
prayer  introduces  him,  these  desires  stand  rebuked  and  abashed  ; 
and,  when  the  prayer  is  over,  and  he  faces  the  world  again,  and 
meets  there  and  in  his  own  heart  a  thousand  unsought  solicita- 
tions to  evil,  there  will  lie  upon  him  the  holy  obligation  to  become 
a  co-worker  with  God  in  the  answering  of  his  own  prayer. 

*  Canon  Hay  Aitken,  The  Divifie  Ordinance  of  Prayer ^  21. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER  269 

1.  Here  then  is  the  unanswerable  argument  for  prayer.  It  is 
a  cause  which  operates  in  the  world  of  facts.  It  works  like  other 
substantial  realities  of  experience.  In  the  ethical  region  it  has 
power  to  transform  character,  making  bad  persons  good  and 
turning  the  conventionally  good  into  heroes  and  heroines  of  the 
spirit.  There  is  not  a  mission  hall  in  the  slums  of  any  of  our 
great  cities  which  cannot  boast  of  the  moral  achievements  of 
prayer,  some  of  them  dramatic  and  spectacular  enough.  Under 
the  influence  of  mystic  contact  with  the  Unseen,  sinful  habits 
fall  away  from  men  and  women,  and  their  lives  are  lifted  to  new 
planes  of  experience,  where  even  the  face  of  nature  seems  trans- 
figured as  with  an  ideal  glory.  Unsuspected  spiritual  possibilities 
leap  into  activity,  and  the  subjects  of  this  wonderful  experience 
speak  of  themselves  henceforth  as  "new-born".  In  psycho- 
logical language,  the  social  relation  implied  in  prayer  is  realized 
and  a  larger  and  better  self  than  the  self  hitherto  known  has 
become  a  fact. 

IT  Mr.  Harold  Begbie,  in  his  well-known  book,  Twice-horn 
Men,  tells  the  story  of  a  habitual  criminal  who  passed  through 
such  a  spiritual  crisis.  This  man  began  his  career  of  crime  by 
committing  a  burglary  when  he  was  thirteen  years  of  age.  Not 
only  was  he  a  criminal,  but  he  rejoiced  in  his  anti-social  deeds. 
Most  of  his  time  was  spent  in  prison.  During  one  of  these  periods 
of  enforced  seclusion  the  thought  occurred  to  him  that  there 
was  something  wrong  with  his  life  and  that  prayer  might  set  it 
right.  For  the  first  time  in  his  life  he  prayed.  It  was  a  very  un- 
conventional prayer.  He  besought  Heaven  to  send  him  a  good 
woman  who  would  marry  him,  and  give  him  a  chance  to  live  a 
respectable  life.  On  getting  out  of  prison  he  continued  to  pray, 
until  at  last  the  crisis  came  at  a  religious  meeting,  when  the 
desire  to  steal  passed  from  him  never  to  return.  He  has  shown, 
by  an  honoured  and  useful  life  since  then,  that  the  change  was 
absolute  and  complete.^ 

IF  In  the  Old  Testament  we  find  prayers  for  moral  strength, 
and  victory  over  soul-besetments,  specimen  prayers,  doubtless,  of 
a  vast  number  that  are  unreported.  "  Clear  thou  me  from  hidden 
faults.  Keep  back  thy  servant  from  presumptuous  sins;  let 
them  not  have  dominion  over  me  "  (Ps.  xix.  12).  "Search  me, 
O  God,  and  know  my  heart :  try  me,  and  know  my  thoughts : 
and  see  if  there  be  any  way  of  wickedness  in  me,  and  lead  me  in 

^  S.  McComb,  Prayer  :  Wliat  it  Is  and  What  it  Does,  15. 


270    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

the  way  everlasting"  (cxxxix.  23,  24).  "My  soul  cleaveth  unto 
the  dust :  quicken  me  according  to  thy  word  "  (cxix.  25).  "  Order 
my  footsteps  in  thy  word  :  and  let  not  any  iniquity  have  dom- 
inion over  me  "  (133).  'T  have  gone  astray  like  a  lost  sheep  ; 
seek  thy  servant ;  for  I  do  not  forget  thy  commandments " 
(176).  Then,  the  response  to  such  prayers.  "Herestoreth  my 
soul :  he  guideth  me  in  the  paths  of  righteousness  for  his  name's 
sake  "  (Ps.  xxiii.  3).  *'  He  will  have  compassion  upon  us  ;  he 
will  subdue  our  iniquities"  (Micah  vii.  19).  "  Thou  hast  magni- 
fied thy  word  above  all  thy  name.  In  the  day  that  I  called, 
thou  answeredst  me,  thou  didst  encourage  me  with  strength  in  my 
soul"  (Ps.  cxxxviii.  2,  3).^       ^ 

IT  Father,  I  pray  Thee,  cleanse  me  through  Thy  word.  Let  it 
search  out  and  bring  to  light  all  that  is  of  self  and  the  flesh  in 
my  religion.  Let  it  cut  away  every  root  of  self-confidence,  that 
the  Vine  may  find  me  wholly  free  to  receive  His  life  and  Spirit. 
O  my  Holy  Husbandman,  I  trust  Thee  to  care  for  the  Branch  as 
much  as  for  the  Vine.     Thou  only  art  my  hope.^ 

2.  Prayer  counteracts  earthly-mindedness.  So  long  as  we  re- 
main subject  to  our  present  conditions  of  education  and  develop- 
ment by  trial,  we  shall  ever  be  conscious  in  our  spiritual  experiences 
of  the  downward  pull,  the  gravitating  force  of  earthly  influences. 
How  many,  alas  !  succumb  altogether  to  these,  and  become  of  the 
earth  earthy !  Against  this  danger  the  mere  habit  of  prayer, 
not  to  speak  of  the  power  that  comes  by  prayer,  is  a  great  and 
continuous  assistance.  How  helpful  it  is,  as  the  season  set  apart 
for  prayer  comes  round,  to  lay  aside  for  a  time  all  the  thronging 
cares  and  interests  of  life,  save  in  so  far  as  one  remembers  them 
for  purposes  of  intercession  or  supplication,  and  to  find  one's  self, 
for  a  few  moments  at  least,  in  a  calmer,  holier  region,  dealing 
with  the  realities  of  the  inner  world,  and  holding  hallowed  inter- 
course with  Him  whose  presence  fills  it. 

Surely  the  more  profoundly  we  are  impressed  with  the  reality 
of  that  spiritual  environment,  the  more  we  "  taste  the  power  of 
the  world  to  come,"  the  less  able  are  earth  and  the  things  of 
earth  to  hold  us  down ;  and  while  the  grosser  element  in  our 
nature  is,  one  may  almost  say,  for  the  time  being  in  abeyance, 
the  higher  claims  its  own  proper  rights,  and  finds  its  powers  in- 

^  W.  A.  Cornaby,  Prayer  and  the  Human  Problem,  111. 
'  Andrew  Murray,  The  Mystery  of  the  True  Vine,  49. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER  271 

crease  by  exercise.  The  first  thing  that  happens  to  those  who 
wait  upon  the  Lord  is  that  they  ''renew  their  strength"  and 
"  mount  up  with  wings  as  eagles ".  No  wonder  if,  after  such 
higher  flights  of  the  soul,  we  find  ourselves  possessed  of  a  holy 
enthusiasm  that  enables  us  to  run  on  errands  of  mercy  and  not 
grow  weary,  and  in  the  practical  and  sober  routine  of  daily  life, 
"  to  walk,  and  not  faint  ". 

It  may  well  be  questioned  whether  we  should  be  able  to  re- 
tain our  spirituality  at  all  if  there  were  no  such  thing  as  prayer. 
Does  it  not  seem  as  if  without  this  we  should  be  fairly  mastered 
by  our  material  environment  ?  We  remember  how  the  Apostle 
sums  up  the  case  against  the  enemies  of  the  cross  of  Christ  in  the 
words,  "  who  mind  earthly  things,"  and  he  goes  on  to  affirm  that 
"  our  citizenship  is  in  the  heavens ".  But  unless  we  claim  our 
privileges  as  citizens  of  that  higher  kingdom  and  exercise  the  func- 
tions of  citizenship,  how  easily  do  we  fall  into  the  habit  which  St. 
Paul  so  strongly  condemns,  and  set  our  mind  on  earthly  things  ! 

Prayer,  if  it  be  real  and  spiritual,  raises  us  to  our  proper 
plane,  and  counteracts  the  earthward  tendency  against  which  we 
have  so  carefully  to  guard.  The  privilege  of  access  to  the  King 
of  kings  is  the  birthright  of  all  true  citizens  of  the  heavenly 
country :  and  they  who  value  their  birthright  will  learn  to  be 
thankful  for  the  very  needs  which  lead  them  to  seek  an  audience 
of  Him  whom  to  know  with  the  reverent  intimacy  of  adoring 
love  is,  indeed,  eternal  life. 

If  In  prayer,  earnest  prayer,  we  exist,  for  the  time,  even  now, 
in  the  things  of  eternity  and  of  heaven.  We  form  the  habit,  and 
practise  the  habit,  of  realizing  and  communicating  with  a  world 
not  seen.  We  learn  to  disconnect  the  two  ideas,  real  and  visible. 
We  should  not  kneel  thus,  nor  thus  speak,  nor  thus  confess  and 
praise  and  pray,  if  there  were  not  some  One  out  of  sight  who  is 
all-wise  and  all-mighty  and  all-good ;  if  there  were  not  interests 
more  engrossing,  and  works  more  important,  and  pleasures  more 
satisfying,  than  those  of  earth  and  time ;  if  there  were  not 
counsels  formed,  and  plans  laid,  and  powers  operating,  quite 
apart  from  and  above  the  relations  of  human  society  and  the 
arrangements  of  confederate  kings,  nor  if  we  ourselves  had  no 
part  nor  lot  in  those  everlasting  realities  of  which  the  shadows 
only  and  the  phantoms  are  here.^ 

^  C.  J.  Vaughan,  Voices  of  the  Prophets,  230. 


272    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  "  If  I  try  to  pray,  I  must  make  an  effort  to  realize  the 
presence,  the  nearness,  the  accessibleness,  of  the  Most  High  God. 
A  necessity  is  laid  upon  me,  and  for  a  little  while  at  least  I  must 
deal  with  spiritual  thinga  If  I  would  pray,  I  must  break  some 
of  the  fetters  that  bind  me,  must  dash  out  of  the  narrow  confines 
of  sense  into  the  world  of  changeless  reality,  out  of  the  confused 
region  of  seeming  into  that  of  being."  ^ 


n. 

Character. 

If  prayer  is  what  we  believe  it  to  be,  intercourse  with  God,  it 
must  have  a  marked  effect  upon  the  development  of  character. 
It  is  noteworthy  that  whilst  education  alone  by  no  means  invari- 
ably develops  personality,  sometimes  rather  restricting  it,  cutting 
off  individual  expression,  and  compressing  it  to  a  pale  copy  of  con- 
ventional ideas,  men  of  prayer,  however  rugged  and  uneducated, 
are  always  personalities.  Surely  if  prayer  is  spiritual  energy, 
its  vigorous  and  sustained  use  must  react  upon  the  character  of 
the  user.  Would  not  more  attention  to  prayer,  not  simply  as  a 
habit  of  piety  but  as  a  life-force,  result  in  such  development  of 
character  as  would  better  equip  any  man  for  life  ?  If  life  is 
given  from  God,  the  art  of  living  is  living  as  God  meant  life  to 
be  lived.  That  can  come  only  from  communion  with  Him  and 
intimacy  with  His  will,  such  as  prayer  affords.  There  has  been 
many  a  personality  which  has  not  fulfilled  its  promise.  One 
feels  bound  to  ask  whether  it  has  fallen  short  because  it  has 
grown  out  of  touch  with  the  life-scheme  for  which  God  created 
it.  The  prayerful,  prayer-directed  life  can  hardly  fail  to  find  the 
straightest  path  to  its  goal.  Modern  religious  psychology  is 
rebuking  Christianity  for  not  utilizing  its  natural  resources. 
Neither  in  the  depth  nor  in  the  height  lies  our  help.  It  is  nigh 
unto  us,  in  the  heart  and  the  mouth  that  will  pray,  and  pray 
with  understanding. 

1.  Prayer  is  both  discipline  and  education. 
(1)  Prayer  is  discipline. — We  have  heard  of  schools  in  which 
the  instruction  was  good,  but  the  discipline  bad.     It  is  in  that 

*  H.  R.  Reynolds,  TJie  Philosophy  of  Prayer,  14. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER 


273 


sense  that  the  word  is  now  used.  What  do  we  mean  by  good 
discipline  in  a  school  ?  We  mean  nothing  imaginary,  nothing 
fanciful,  nothing  (to  a  practical  observer)  ambiguous.  An  ex- 
perienced visitor  feels  rather  than  argues  the  presence  or  the 
absence  of  this  characteristic.  There  is  a  readiness,  a  promptitude, 
an  alacrity  of  response  to  the  first  signal  of  command  or  of  pro- 
hibition ;  a  thoroughness,  a  completeness,  a  perfection  of  obedience  ; 
a  kind  of  electric  or  magical  inter-communion  between  the  mind 
that  wills  and  the  minds  that  obey  which  at  once  secures  the 
performance,  and  yet  takes  out  of  it  the  whole  idea  of  constraint 
or  terror. 

We  speak  of  the  discipline  of  life.  It  is  a  common  figure 
which  describes  this  world  as  a  vast  school,  in  which  men  are 
placed,  for  the  whole  of  their  threescore  years  and  ten  or  four- 
score years,  to  learn  wisdom  by  experience.  The  essence  of 
discipline  is  the  schooling  of  the  will;  the  correction  of  the 
natural  pride,  so  that  it  shall  recognize  another  existence  and 
obey  a  higher  law  ;  the  existence  and  the  law  of  Him  in  whom 
all  "live  and  move  and  have  their  being".  Discipline  is  the 
subjugation  of  the  self-will  to  the  will  of  One  higher  and  greater 
and  more  excellent  than  it.  And  this  subjugation,  of  which  a 
well-ordered  school  furnishes  an  earthly  type,  is  the  object — as 
believing  men  feel — of  all  that  system  and  course  of  the  indi- 
vidual life  which  is  as  uniform  in  its  principle  as  it  is  multi- 
farious in  its  working. 

Now,  just  what  life  is,  in  this  respect,  as  a  whole,  that  the 
particular  ordinance  of  prayer  is  as  a  part:  not  life  only,  but 
prayer,  is  a  discipline.  Prayer  is  a  discipline  because  it  shows 
us  what  we  are  :  how  infirm  of  purpose,  how  irresolute  in  self- 
control,  how  impotent  even  to  feel  as  we  would,  even  to  desire 
that  which  we  know  we  want. 

IF  The  inner  chamber  into  which  we  retire  for  prayer  is  a 
gymnasium  for  the  soul.  The  apparatus  of  prayer  is  designed 
by  God  to  yield  "  the  peaceable  fruit  of  righteousness  unto 
them  which  are  exercised  thereby  ".  When  we  open  the  windows 
towards  Jerusalem  we  take  deep  draughts  of  the  heavenly 
breezes ;  this  is  a  valuable  form  of  spiritual  culture. 

Prayer  is  the  Christian's  vital  breath, 
The  Christian's  native  air. 
18 


274    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

To  fill  the  lungs  of  the  soul  with  spiritual  ozone  from  "  the  sea 
of  glass  mingled  with  fire  "  will  cleanse  from  defilement  and  will 
revivify  neglected  tissues.  The  effort  to  realize  God  stretches 
the  sinews  of  the  soul  and  hardens  its  muscles,  i 

IF  A  course  of  instruction  in  the  school  of  spiritual  culture  is 
much  to  be  commended  to  the  average  Christian.  Too  many- 
believers  belong  to  the  species  the  Peacock  Christian.  This 
species  is  distinguished  by  a  tail  of  magnificent  proportions.  The 
proud  bird  is  worthy  of  all  admiration  so  long  as  it  is  only 
required  to  strut  along  the  ground.  But  it  is  ill-supplied  with 
wings  for  soaring.  When  a  bird  is  needed  to  fly  to  the  crest  of 
some  high  crag,  the  Peacock  must  retire  and  give  place  to  the 
Eagle.  There  is  a  species  of  Christian  to  be  known  as  the  Eagle 
Christian.  This  species  has  no  tail  to  speak  of,  but  it  has  wonder- 
ful wings.  The  Peacock  Christian  is  good  at  strutting;  the 
Eagle  Christian  is  good  at  soaring.  Now,  it  should  be  manifest 
to  all  that  soaring  is  a  more  Christian  occupation  than  strutting. 
Therefore  the  Eagle  Christian  is  to  be  preferred  to  the  Peacock 
Christian.  Where  can  the  Eagle  Christian  be  found?  In  the 
inner  chamber.  How  can  those  powerful  pinions  be  developed  ? 
By  constant  prayer.  "  They  that  wait  upon  the  Lord  shall  renew 
their  strength  :  they  shall  mount  up  with  wings  as  eagles."  The 
directions  of  God's  Word  are  plain.  If  we  would  be  Eagle 
Christians,  we  must  "  wait  upon  the  Lord  "  :  we  must  enter  into 
our  chamber,  and  shut  the  door,  and  pray  to  the  Father  which  is 
in  secret.  Then  our  wings  will  grow.  It  is  possible  that  they 
may  grow  at  the  expense  of  the  tail.  Let  it  go !  The  exchange 
is  worth  making.  The  world  can  aftbrd  to  dispense  with  some 
of  our  fine  feathers ;  it  needs  sadly  more  soaring  spirits.^ 

(2)  Prayer  is  education. — Education  is  not  instruction.  The 
best  instructed  man  in  the  world  might  be  the  worst  educated. 
Education  is  the  bringing  up.  Education  is  the  training  for  life. 
Education  is  the  calling  out  of  powers,  the  strengthening  of 
faculties,  the  counteraction  of  faults,  the  controlling  and  coercing 
of  vices,  the  preparation  of  the  whole  man  for  the  whole  of  being, 
the  presentation  of  body,  soul,  and  spirit,  equipped  for  the  work 
of  time  and  for  the  enjoyment  of  eternity. 

All  God's  dealings  with  us  are  of  the  nature  of  an  education. 
God  educated  the  world  by  a  succession  of  Divine  revelations, 
training  it  gradually,  by  elements  and  rudiments,  by  types  and 

»  J.  E.  Roberts,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions,  173.  ^Ihid.,  175. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER 


275 


symbols,  by  precepts  and  prophecies  for  the  full  illumination  of 
the  gospel  and  of  the  Spirit.  He  formed  habits  in  man  of  thought 
and  judgment,  of  principle  and  action,  that  He  might  bring  him 
out  at  last,  in  the  fulness  of  grace  and  knowledge,  to  be  His 
representative  and  His  witness  on  an  earth  too  long  debased  by 
his  fall  and  defiled  by  his  sin.  And  God  educates  each  man  by  a 
system  of  personal  dealing,  of  which  the  characteristic  is  the 
same ;  it  is  an  education  ;  it  is  a  formation  of  habits,  whether  of 
thought  or  of  action,  under  the  direction  of  His  Providence,  His 
Word,  His  Church,  His  Spirit.  And  prayer  is  one  chief  part  of 
this  education. 

IT  A  perfect  Christian  character  is  a  very  beautiful  product. 
It  includes  a  bunch  of  Christian  graces,  each  of  them  exquisitely 
lovely,  and  each  of  them  delicately  harmonized  with  all  the  others. 
Such  a  character  cannot  be  developed  easily.  "  Come  and  learn 
of  me,"  said  the  great  Teacher.  No  sooner  do  we  come  than  we 
discover  how  much  we  have  to  learn.  He  is  so  fair  that  it  will 
take  us  a  long  time  to  become  like  Him.  We  have  to  cultivate 
many  graces;  faith,  hope,  love,  humility,  reverence,  meekness, 
gentleness,  long-suffering,  unselfishness,  spirituality — these  are 
some  of  the  flowers  that  bloom  in  the  garden  of  the  Lord,  and 
that  must  flourish  in  our  soul  if  it  is  to  become  as  a  watered 
garden  wherein  the  Beloved  of  our  souls  delights  to  walk.  There 
is  no  universal  recipe  for  cultivating  all  the  graces.  But  it  is 
certain  that  prayer  provides  a  marvellously  congenial  soil  for 
their  healthy  growth.^ 

2.  Prayer,  earnest  and  continued,  has  its  influence  on  our 
faculties. 

(1)  It  strengthens  the  mind. — It  has  been  observed  that 
persons  without  natural  ability  have,  through  the  earnestness  of 
their  devotional  habits,  acquired  in  time  powers  of  sustained 
thought,  and  an  accuracy  and  delicacy  of  intellectual  touch,  which 
would  not  else  have  belonged  to  them.  The  intellect  being  the 
instrument  by  which  the  soul  handles  religious  truth,  a  real 
interest  in  religious  truth  will  of  itself  often  furnish  an  educa- 
tional discipline  ;  it  alone  educates  an  intellect  which  would  other- 
wise be  uneducated. 

II  One  day,  a  student,  interviewing  him  privately,  was  pro- 
pounding to  him  some  theological  enigmas,  perhaps  a  little  self- 

^  J.  E.  Roberts,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions,  177. 


276   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

consciously  and  perhaps  half  hoping  to  entangle  the  Professor  in 
speculative  toils.  After  listening  to  him  for  a  while,  Dr.  Rainy 
suddenly  said,  "  Did  you  ever  take  this  difficulty  to  God  in  prayer, 
Mr. ? "  Then  he  went  on  to  discuss  it,  not  with  mere  dia- 
lectic, but  out  of  his  own  religious  experience,  and,  after  some 
talk,  knelt  down  and  gave  utterance  to  the  simplest  and  devout- 
est  prayer.^ 

(2)  Prayer  invigorates  the  will. — Habitual  prayer  constantly 
confers  decision  on  the  wavering,  and  energy  on  the  listless,  and 
calmness  on  the  excitable,  and  disinterestedness  on  the  selfish. 
It  braces  the  moral  nature  by  transporting  it  into  a  clear,  in- 
vigorating, unearthly  atmosphere ;  it  builds  up  the  moral  life, 
insensibly  but  surely,  remedying  its  deficiencies,  and  strengthen- 
ing its  weak  points,  till  there  emerges  a  comparatively  symmetri- 
cal and  consistent  whole,  the  excellence  of  which  all  must  admit, 
though  its  secret  is  known  only  to  those  who  know  it  by 
experience. 

IT  Prayer,  in  so  far  as  it  implies  that  the  mind  has  been  up- 
lifted towards  an  ideal  of  all  goodness,  a  going  out  into  the 
infinite,  is  invaluable  to  man,  and  marks  the  great  distinction 
between  him  and  the  lower  animals.  It  is  answered  so  far  as  it  is 
high  and  holy  inspiration,  being  an  exercise  of  mind  which  there- 
by creates  the  condition  it  prays  for.  After  all,  we  do  not  know 
that  mind  power  has  not  a  material  existence  somewhere,  just  as 
much  as  electricity  has.  If  will-power  could  be  brought  together 
as  a  concentrated  force,  it  might  have  very  astonishing  results. 
At  present  it  is  too  broken  up.^ 

3.  What  are  the  virtues  which  prayer  produces  ?  Let  us  look 
at  some  of  them  separately. 

(1)  It  produces  a  sense  of  sinfulness. — When  prayer  once 
brings  man  into  the  felt  presence  of  his  God  and  reveals  to  him 
something  of  God's  own  infinite  holiness.  His  awe-inspiring 
purity  and  His  perfect  hatred  of  sin,  there,  if  anywhere,  will  he 
who  prays  learn  to  abhor  himself,  to  loathe  his  own  deep  sinful- 
ness, to  repent,  to  cleanse  his  hands  and  purify  his  heart,  "  per- 
fecting holiness  in  the  fear  of  the  Lord  ". 

(2)  It  produces  humility  of  mind — so  ornamental  to  Christian 
character.     Paul  was  like  the  rest  of  us  in  one  respect — in  danger 

ip.  C.  Simpson,  The  Life  of  Principal  Rainy ^  i.  211. 
^  George  Frederick  Watts,  ii.  223. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER  277 

of  being  "  exalted  above  due  measure  ".  Job  had  a  good  deal  to 
say  about  himself.  It  was  all  Job,  what  Job  was  and  what  Job 
had  done,  until  God  took  him  to  task,  told  him  to  gird  up  his 
loins  and  answer  a  few  questions,  when  Job  learned  his  lesson — 
that  he  was  but  a  worm  as  compared  with  God,  and  he  went 
down  in  the  dust  and  said,  "I  abhor  myself".  When  we  see 
God's  greatness  we  recognize  our  own  littleness. 

Humility  is  not  the  contempt  of  self  for  self's  sake,  it  is  the 
forgetfulness  of  self  for  love's  sake.  And  it  evidences  itself  first 
in  that  largeness  of  soul  which  gives  us  leisure  and  liberty  to 
honour  all  men,  to  contemplate  their  excellences,  to  consider  their 
virtues,  to  acquaint  ourselves  with  their  worthiness,  until  we 
learn  to  esteem  them  more  highly  than  we  esteem  ourselves, 
until  we  joyfully  give  God  thanks  for  the  grace  which  He  has 
bestowed  upon  them. 

IF  The  motto  of  the  Gottesfreunde  was,  "  Love  to  be  unknown, 
and  desire  to  be  little  esteemed ".  A  like  temper  is  encouraged 
in  the  Church  of  the  Unitas  Fratrum,  which  used  to  put  this 
prayer  into  the  lips  of  its  members  :  "  From  the  unhappy  desire 
of  becoming  great,  preserve  and  keep  us,  gracious  Lord  and  God  ".^ 

(3)  It  produces  that  submission  of  will  which  is  one  of  the 
chief  conditions  of  acceptable  approach  unto  God.  More  elements 
than  one  enter  into  true  religion.  To  be  truly  religious  is  to  do 
the  will  of  God.  But  Liddon  has  shown  us  how  prayer  is  also 
religion  in  action.  To  pray  is  to  put  not  only  the  affections  in 
motion,  the  will  in  motion,  but  the  understanding  in  motion  as 
well.  Thus  in  prayer  a  man  comes  to  see  that  other  interests  than 
his  own  are  in  the  hands  of  God,  that  what  he  asks  might  not 
in  the  end  be  best,  and  that  in  view  of  God's  infinite  wisdom  He 
must  know  what  is  best,  in  view  of  His  infinite  justice  He  must 
do  what  is  best,  and  in  view  of  His  perfect  love  He  must  desire 
what  is  best ;  and  so  believing  with  all  his  heart  that  even  as  God 
hath  said,  "  All  things  work  together  for  good  to  them  that  love 
God,"  he  can  say  with  becoming  grace,  "  Thy  will,  O  God,  and 
not  mine,  be  done  ".  God  is  always  on  our  side  ;  it  is  necessary 
sometimes  to  pray  ourselves  over  to  His  side. 

Prayer  is  essentially  submission.  To  pray  is  to  submit,  and 
to  submit  is  to  pray.     Nothing  could  well  be  more  wide  of  the 

1  D.  M.  Molntyre,  Waymarks  in  the  Pursuit  of  Qod,  122. 


278    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

heavenly  mark  than  the  vulgar  and  commonplace  conception  of 
prayer — the  conception  which  supposes  prayer  to  be  a  kind  of 
spiritual  and  resistless  agency  for  inducing  God  to  do  what  we 
wish ;  to  avert  our  calamities  and  fulfil  our  desires.  Nothing 
could  be  more  remote  from  the  truth  than  this  selfish  notion  of 
the  character  of  prayer.  True  prayer  is  not  selfishness  but  sub- 
mission. Selfishness  is  destructive  of  prayer  ;  prayer  is  victorious 
over  selfishness.  They  never  truly  pray  who  pray  that  their 
own  will  may  be  done,  and  that  they  themselves  may  have  their 
way.  In  the  truest  prayer  there  is  no  will  except  the  will  of 
God,  no  way  except  the  way  of  Heaven.  To  submit  to  the  way 
of  Heaven,  to  surrender  to  the  will  of  God,  this,  and  this  only,  is 
truly  to  pray ;  to  pray  in  the  name,  and  after  the  manner,  of 
Christ. 

IF  The  pull  of  our  prayer  may  not  move  the  everlasting  throne, 
but,  like  the  pull  on  a  fine  from  the  bow  of  a  boat,  it  may  draw  us 
into  closer  fellowship  with  God  and  fuller  harmony  with  His  wise 
and  holy  will.^ 

(4)  One  of  the  chief  fruits  of  prayer  in  the  daily  life  is  peace. 
"In  everything  by  prayer  and  supplication  with  thanksgiving 
let  your  requests  be  made  known  unto  God.  And  the  peace  of 
God,  which  passeth  all  understanding,  shall  keep  your  hearts  and 
minds  through  Christ  Jesus."  A  life  of  prayer  is  a  life  of  peace. 
There  may  be  plenty  of  outward  trials  and  troubles  in  such  a 
life,  but  there  will  be  inward  peace — peace  of  heart  and  mind. 
Not  alike  perhaps  and  equally  in  all,  for  calmer  natures  realize 
peace  more  easily  than  others,  and  at  times  even  natural  quietude 
of  disposition  may  be  mistaken  for  true  peace.  But  in  all  who 
truly  pray,  some  degree  of  peace  will  be  found.  Even  restless, 
eager,  unquiet,  passion-tossed  souls  are  not  without  their  visions 
of  peace,  if  they  truly  pray.  Their  natural  restlessness  may  mar 
and  interrupt  it  continually;  yet  at  the  bottom  of  their  hearts 
there  will  be  a  blessed  sense  of  peacefulness  which  they  can 
realize  in  their  calmer  moments,  and  especially  in  the  hour  of 
prayer. 

IF  In  the  most  emphatic  exhortations  to  be  found  in  Scripture 
for  having  recourse  to  this  solace,  the  relief  promised  has  respect 

T.  L.  Cuyler, 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER  279 

rather  to  the  peace  which  follows  on  the  putting  up  of  our  prayers 
than  to  any  promise  that,  in  our  time  and  way  at  least,  the  prayer 
itself  should  be  granted.  "  In  everything,  by  prayer  and  suppli- 
cation with  thanksgiving,  let  your  requests  be  made  known  unto 
God.  And  the  peace  of  God,  which  passeth  all  understanding, 
shall  keep  your  hearts  and  minds  through  Christ  Jesus.*'  Here 
everything,  you  see,  turns  upon  the  resulting  peace.  It  is  as  if 
the  apostle  had  said,  to  anxious  parents,  for  instance :  "I  do  not 
promise  that,  in  answer  to  your  prayers,  your  child  shall  be  raised 
up  from  a  bed  of  sickness  :  only  that  while  it  lies  there  you  shall 
have  peace  ".  Or  as  if  to  a  family  in  great  trouble,  he  had  said  : 
"  I  do  not  promise  that  that  black  cloud  which  is  now  gathering 
over  you  and  around  you,  with  such  thick  and  disastrous  gloom, 
shall  dissipate ;  but  that  in  the  cloud,  and  through  the  cloud,  and 
even  while  there  seems  no  way  out  of  the  cloud,  you  shall  have 
peace  ".  You  have  made  your  requests  known  unto  God.  They 
may  be  wise,  or  they  may  be  unwise.  The  time  may  be  too  soon 
for  granting  them,  or  too  late.  Whether  of  the  twain  you  know 
not,  and  must  not  be  careful  to  know.  The  matter  is  before  the 
throne.  Grief,  trouble,  disappointment,  a  bright  result  or  a  sad, 
— they  are  all  in  the  ordering  of  Him  who  upholds  the  world. 
Enough  that  you  say  with  David,  "  Lord,  I  make  my  prayer  unto 
thee  in  an  acceptable  time  ".  If  it  be  granted,  I  bless.  If  it  be 
postponed,  I  wait.     If  it  be  denied,  I  bow.^ 

4.  Let  us  illustrate  the  effect  of  prayer  on  the  soul  by  borrow- 
ing the  words  of  two  modern  writers  of  fiction,  the  one  American, 
the  other  English.  For  the  facts  of  the  spiritual  life  have,  for 
better  or  worse,  come  into  the  common  speech  of  men.  The  old 
primness  is  gone,  and  a  novelist  no  longer  hesitates  to  preach,  or 
to  handle  the  things  of  religion. 

(1)  James  Lane  Allen,  in  The  Choir  Invisible,  speaking  of  an 
old  face  which  retains  the  freshness  of  Easter  lilies,  says  :  "  For 
prayer  will  in  time  make  the  human  countenance  its  own  divinest 
altar;  years  upon  years  of  fine  thoughts,  like  music  shut  up 
within,  will  vibrate  along  the  nerves  of  expression  until  the  lines 
of  the  living  instrument  are  drawn  into  correspondence  and  the 
harmony  of  visible  form  matches  the  unheard  harmony  of  the 
mind  ".  This  exquisite  carving  of  the  face  of  one  who  is  habitu- 
ally in  prayer  cannot  be  mistaken ;  it  is  a  sacrament,  "  the  out- 
ward and  visible  sign  of  an  inward  and  spiritual  grace ".     The 

^  Daniel  Moore,  Aids  to  Prayer,  36. 


28o  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

beauty  gained  in  this  way  survives  the  flight  of  youth,  and  is 
clearest  in  old  age ;  nay,  after  death,  the  face  of  a  praying  soul 
in  the  stillness  and  the  expectation  shines  with  a  light  which 
seems  at  once  to  beam  out  of  it  and  to  fall  upon  it. 

IF  Jesus  in  the  act  of  prayer  was  transfigured ;  He  became 
radiant  and  even  His  garment  glistened.  In  their  degree,  all 
praying  souls  are  so  transfigured.  The  tranquil  joy,  assured 
against  storm  and  sorrow ;  the  suggestion  of  that  peace  which  the 
world  neither  gives  nor  takes  away;  the  rest  of  the  soul  in  the 
bosom  of  God  ;  the  sense  of  the  legions  of  invisible  angels  at 
hand ;  the  circumambient  atmosphere  of  another  world ;  these 
are  the  marks  of  those  who  are  exercised  in  prayer.  So  Percival 
saw  in  the  eyes  of  the  holy  maid  praying  for  the  Holy  Grail, 

Beyond  my  knowing  of  them,  beautiful, 
Beyond  all  knowing  of  them,  wonderful. 
Beautiful  in  the  light  of  holiness.^ 

(2)  But  even  when  this  outward  effect  is  not  yet  produced, 
the  inward  reality  may  be  already  there.  And  this  the  English 
novelist,  Mr.  A.  C.  Benson,  refers  to  in  Beside  Still  Waters.  The 
speaker  has  discovered  the  effectiveness  of  a  certain  kind  of 
prayer  :  "  This  was  not  a  mechanical  repetition  of  verbal  forms, 
but  a  strong  and  secret  uplifting  of  the  heart  to  the  Father  of  all. 
There  were  moments  when  one  seemed  baffled  and  powerless, 
when  one's  own  strength  seemed  utterly  unequal  to  the  burden ; 
prayer  on  such  occasions  did  not  necessarily  bring  a  perfect 
serenity  and  joy,  though  there  were  times  when  it  brought  even 
that ;  but  it  brought  sufficient  strength  ;  it  made  the  difficult,  the 
dreaded  thing  possible.  ...  It  seemed  to  reveal  a  dim  form 
moving  behind  the  veil  of  things,  which  in  the  moment  of 
entreaty  seemed  to  suspend  its  progress,  to  stop,  and  draw  near, 
to  smile." 

Whoever  has  made  it  a  practice  to  spend  certain  hours  or 
half -hours  in  the  day  alone  with  God  knows  the  extraordinary 
effect  produced  by  the  gradual  accumulation  of  experiences,  and 
the  settled  habit  of  the  soul.  Many  of  those  hours  seem  dry  and 
listless ;  there  is  no  sign  or  sound ;  many  of  them  are  burdened 
and  sad  with  the  sense  of  sin  and  the  weight  of  sorrow.  Only 
now  and  then  does  prayer  become  so  limpid  and  spontaneous  and 

1  B.  F.  Horton,  My  Belief,  183. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER  281 

vocal  that  one  is  constrained  to  write  down  the  words  of  the 
illuminated  moments.  And  yet  the  habit  in  long  years  secures  a 
remarkable  result.  The  assured  presence  of  God;  the  fact  of 
redemption  in  the  cross ;  the  knowledge  of  a  life  hidden  with 
Christ  in  God ;  the  ready  recourse  to  God  in  a  moment  of  surprise 
or  danger ;  the  conscious  connexion  between  the  soul,  as  a  small 
fact  in  time  and  space,  and  the  infinite  and  eternal  God ;  these 
become  the  very  atmosphere  and  meat  and  drink  of  the  inward 
life.i 

^  "  I  have  known  men,"  says  Goodwin — it  must  have  been 
himself — "  who  came  to  God  for  nothing  else  but  just  to  come  to 
Him,  they  so  loved  Him.  They  scorned  to  soil  Him  and  them- 
selves with  any  other  errand  than  just  purely  to  be  alone  with 
Him  in  His  presence.  Friendship  is  best  kept  up,  even  among 
men,  by  frequent  visits ;  and  the  more  free  and  defecate  those 
frequent  visits  are,  and  the  less  occasioned  by  business,  or  necessity, 
or  custom  they  are,  the  more  friendly  and  welcome  they  are."  ^ 

In  the  quietness  of  life. 

When  the  flowers  have  shut  their  eye, 

And  a  stainless  breadth  of  sky 

Bends  above  the  hill  of  strife, 

Then,  my  God,  my  chiefest  Good, 

Breathe  upon  my  lonelihood  : 

Let  the  shining  silence  be 

Filled  with  Thee,  my  God,  with  Thee.^ 

Ill 

Power. 

1.  Each  faculty,  or  endowment,  or  form  of  activity  that  belongs 
to  man  has,  over  and  above  a  number  of  more  indirect  effects,  its 
appropriate  and  characteristic  action,  in  which  its  whole  strength 
is  embarked,  and  in  which  it  finds  its  full  play  and  impetus.  To 
this  law  religion  is  no  exception.  While  its  influence  upon  human 
life  is  strong  and  various  in  proportion  to  its  high  aim  and  object ; 
while  it  is  felt,  when  it  wields  real  empire,  in  every  department 
of  human  activity  and  interest,  as  an  invigorating,  purifying, 
chastening,   restraining,  guiding  influence,  it   too  has  a  work 

1  R.  F.  Horton.  2  a.  Whyte,  Santa  Teresa,  21. 

*  P.  C.  Ainsworth,  The  Threshold  Grace,  85. 


282    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

peculiarly  its  own.  In  this  work  it  is  wont  to  embark  its  collec- 
tive forces,  and  to  become  peculiarly  conscious  of  its  direction 
and  intensity.  This  work  is  prayer.  Prayer  is  emphatically 
religion  in  action.  It  is  the  soul  of  man  engaging  in  that  parti- 
cular form  of  activity  which  pre-supposes  the  existence  of  a  great 
bond  between  itself  and  God.  Prayer  is,  therefore,  nothing  more 
or  less  than  the  noblest  kind  of  human  exertioa  It  is  the  one 
department  of  action  in  which  man  realizes  the  highest  privilege 
and  capacity  of  his  being.  And,  in  doing  this,  he  is  himself  en- 
riched and  ennobled  almost  indefinitely :  now,  as  of  old,  when  he 
comes  down  from  the  mountain,  his  face  bears  tokens  of  an 
irradiation  which  is  not  of  this  world. 

So,  I  soberly  laid  my  last  plan 

To  extinguish  the  man. 

Round  his  creep-hole,  with  never  a  break 

Ran  my  fires  for  his  sake ; 

Over-head,  did  my  thunder  combine 

With  my  underground  mine  : 

Till  I  looked  from  my  labour  content 

To  enjoy  the  event. 

When  sudden  .  .  .  how  think  ye,  the  end  ? 

Did  I  say  "  without  friend  "  ? 

Say  rather,  from  marge  to  blue  marge 

The  whole  sky  grew  his  targe 

With  the  sun's  self  for  visible  boss, 

While  an  Arm  ran  across 

Which  the  earth  heaved  beneath  like  a  breast 

Where  the  wretch  was  safe  prest ! 

Do  you  see  ?  just  my  vengeance  complete. 

The  man  sprang  to  his  feet, 

Stood  erect,  caught  at  God's  skirts,  and  prayed  1 

So,  /  was  afraid  1  ^ 

2.  The  tonic,  invigorating,  and  enlightening  influence  of 
prayer  in  the  life  of  every  one  who  knows  how  to  pray  is  one  of 
the  most  unquestionable  facts  of  empirical  psychology.  One 
may,  if  one  likes,  assert  dogmatically  the  impossibility  of  any 
"answer  "  to  petitional  prayer,  one  may  explain  "communion" 
as  auto-suggestion,  one  may  deny  the  existence  of  any  God  and 

*  Browning,  Instans  Tyrannus. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER  283 

insist  that  this  is  a  purely  material  universe,  and  still  be  forced 
to  admit  the  almost  unique  value  of  prayer  as  a  source  of  strength 
and  guidance  in  the  lives  of  an  exceedingly  large  proportion  of 
the  community. 

Prayer  is  either  practical,  capable  of  doing  things,  or  it  is 
absurd  and  even  ridiculous.  Either  it  means  unspeakable  blessed- 
ness, enlargement  of  life,  release  of  psychic  energies  hitherto 
bound  fasfc,  a  real  increase  in  spiritual  power,  or  it  is  vanity  and 
emptiness.  Prayer  is  thus  seen,  as  a  matter  of  cold  scientific 
fact,  to  have  an  important  bearing  upon  character.  Like  morality 
or  art,  it  is  a  factor  in  the  formation  of  human  personality. 
Other  things  being  equal,  the  praying  man  has  a  unity  of  life 
and  a  corresponding  forcefulness  of  character  to  which  the  non- 
praying  man  can  lay  no  claim.  As  William  James  remarks  :  "  In 
few  of  us  are  functions  not  tied  up  by  the  exercise  of  other 
functions.  Relatively  few  medical  and  scientific  men  can  pray. 
Few  can  carry  on  any  living  commerce  with  '  God '.  Now  many 
of  us  are  well  aware  of  how  much  freer  and  abler  our  lives  would 
be  were  such  important  forms  of  energizing  not  sealed  up  by  the 
critical  atmosphere  in  which  we  have  been  reared.  There  are  in 
every  one  potential  forms  of  activity  that  actually  are  shunted 
out  from  use.  Part  of  the  imperfect  vitality  under  which  we 
labour  can  thus  be  easily  explained."  It  is  a  matter  of  history 
that  men  who  have  really  prayed  have  also  been  men  of  unusual 
force  of  character.  We  cannot  conceive  that  Martin  Luther  or 
General  Gordon  or  Mr.  Gladstone  would  have  been  the  men  they 
were,  or  would  have  left  the  mark  they  did,  had  they  not  been 
men  of  prayer.  The  Master  of  prayer  seems  to  have  been  most 
impressed  by  its  quality  as  an  energizing  principle  in  human 
nature.  There  has  come  down  to  us  a  great  mystical  saying  of 
His  which  bears  every  mark  of  authenticity  :  * '  This  kind  goeth 
not  out  save  by  prayer  ".  In  other  words,  something  happens 
which  would  not  happen  without  prayer. 

IT  On  ourselves  who  thus  believe  in  the  efficacy  of  prayer, 
and,  therefore,  its  transforming  influence,  an  obligation,  never 
more  serious  than  in  the  present  day,  is  laid,  to  take  care  that 
we  give  as  little  occasion  as  by  Divine  grace  is  possible  to  the 
severe  reproach  that  there  is  a  wide  difference  between  devotion 
and  goodness.     To  allow  prayer  to  react  on  all  sides  of  our  own 


284    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

moral  and  spiritual  character  and  life,  with  all  its  penetrating 
and  comprehensive  power,  is  the  only  real  way  in  which  we  can 
take  our  stand  in  the  long  line  of  witnesses,  by  whom  belief  in 
its  reality  and  efficacy  has  been  handed  on  from  generation  to 
generation.  "  He,"  Dr.  Vaughan  once  said  from  the  University 
pulpit  at  Cambridge,  "  who  goes  forth  from  this  exercise  into  the 
world  of  business,  into  the  world  of  society,  into  the  world  of 
literary,  scientific,  political,  ecclesiastical  activity,  goes  forth  to 
remember  God — goes  forth  (it  is  the  other  half  of  duty)  to  remind 
of  God."  But  such  a  result  can  be  achieved  only  by  conscientious 
observance,  however  brief  for  some  the  observance  may  neces- 
sarily be,  of  stated  seasons,  and  times,  and  modes  of  prayer.  It 
is  through  such  regularity,  such  obedience  to  rule,  that  in  prayer, 
as  indeed  in  all  departments  of  life,  habits  are  gained,  and  we 
become  truly  free,  although  at  the  cost  of  strict  discipline  at  first, 
to  call  this  great  power  into  such  activity  that  it  becomes  the 
means  of  sustaining  the  supernatural  life,  while  it  is  constantly 
reforming  and  transforming  our  natural  faculties.  As  a  beautiful 
flower  becomes  what  it  is  by  living  in  the  sunlight,  so  the  soul 
fulfils  the  design  of  its  creation  and  re-creation  by  turning  to 
God,  revealed  in  the  Person  of  the  Incarnate  Son.  The  reason 
why  nothing  can  be  a  substitute  for  prayer  is  that,  through  its 
practice,  this  contact  is  maintained.  When  that  contact  becomes 
habitual,  our  spiritual  nature  puts  forth  its  influence  over  all  that 
is  material,  the  body  through  which  it  finds  expression,  and  the 
world  which  is  given  us  to  claim  for  God.  Without  that  continu- 
ous contact,  the  spiritual  nature  becomes  itself  materialized,  the 
bond-servant,  at  last,  of  the  flesh  and  of  the  world.^ 

3.  The  power  of  prayer  does  not  belong  to  the  same  order  of 
energy  as  the  forces  of  nature — gravitation,  electricity,  magnet- 
ism and  the  like ;  and  there  is  no  force  resident,  in  the  universe 
but  upon  that  particular  force  prayer  can  lay  its  hand  and  call 
its  might  into  service.  This  becomes  possible  because,  in  dis- 
tinction from  natural  forces,  prayer  is  a  personal  power.  It  has 
personal  intelligence  to  guide  it,  personal  will  to  apply  it,  personal 
life  to  give  it  character  and  energy,  and  tenderness  and  love, 
and,  finally,  personal  control  on  the  higher  side  to  prevent  it  from 
working  awry  from  the  purpose  of  God.  Prayers  in  line  with 
God's  will  move  in  the  realm  of  moral  certainty,  because  they 
are  moral ;  in  the  realm  of  natural  certainty,  because  they  obey 
law ;  and  in  the  realm  of  Divine  certainty,  because  backed  by 
^  A.  J.  Worlledge,  Prayer,  337. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER  285 

the  promises  of  God.  And  these  three  are  stages  in  one  certainty. 
The  energies  of  the  universe  are  arranged  in  hierarchical  order, 
God  Himself  being  supreme — material  forces,  vital  forces,  mental 
forces,  spiritual  forces — the  lower  subject  to  the  higher,  and  all 
controlled  by  a  Person  for  the  benefit  of  persons.  For  He  who 
ruleth  all  things  after  the  counsel  of  His  own  will  maketh  all 
things  work  together  for  good  to  them  that  love  God.  And  more, 
the  Creator  of  all  things  has  delegated  man  with  power  akin  to 
His  own,  and  Divinely  charged  him  to  "  have  dominion  over  the 
fish  of  the  sea,  and  over  the  fowl  of  the  air,  and  over  all  the 
earth  ". 

Along  with  the  crude  and  mechanical  conceptions  which  have 
so  often  dominated  in  theology  and  religion,  we  have  popular 
conceptions  of  prayer  which  do  not  seem  to  grasp  its  ethical 
significance  and  spiritual  value.  Much  of  the  language  concern- 
ing prayer  as  a  "  power  "  seems  to  rest  upon  the  idea  that  its 
operation  is  something  like  that  of  a  physical  force.  In  nature 
physical  forces  produce  certain  definite  and  invariable  results. 
Similar  uniformity  of  sequences  has  sometimes  been  claimed  for 
prayer  ;  and  some  have  been  willing  to  lower  the  whole  subject 
to  the  physical  sphere,  and  put  the  efficacy  of  prayer  to  the  test 
of  experiment  by  means  of  a  "  prayer-gauge ".  Such  an  idea 
derives  all  its  force  from  prevalent  misconceptions  concerning 
the  power  of  prayer.  Our  idea  of  prayer  should  be  elevated 
above  the  physical  sphere,  and  ennobled  by  our  associating  with 
it  the  thought  of  the  moral  and  spiritual  relations  with  which 
prayer  is  primarily  concerned.  The  true  power  of  our  prayers 
with  God  lies  in  the  faith  which  they  utter.  It  was  just  in  this 
connexion  of  ideas  that  Jesus  employed  His  strongest  words 
concerning  the  power  of  prayer,  throwing  His  thought  into  a 
parabolic  form  :  "  If  ye  have  faith,  and  doubt  not  ...  if  ye  shall 
say  unto  this  mountain.  Be  thou  removed,  and  be  thou  cast  into  the 
sea  ;  it  shall  be  done  "  (Matt.  xxi.  21).  Or,  if  Luke  has  preserved 
the  more  exact  setting  of  this  saying  (Luke  xvii.  6),  it  was  in 
response  to  the  prayer  of  the  Apostles,  "  Increase  our  faith,"  that 
Jesus  gave  them  this  assurance  of  how  great  things  are  possible 
to  faith. 

H  This  is  the  meaning  of  prayer.  This  is  the  one  secret  of 
power.     We  simply  become  that  through  which  He  manifests 


286   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

Himself.  And  this  is  the  whole  meaning  of  that  much-talked- 
about,  little-understood  thing  called  "  power  ".  Our  Lord  Jesus 
thorn-torn,  nail-pierced,  now  glory-crowned,  manifesting  Himself 
— this  is  power,  and  only  this.  All  power  has  been  given  unto 
Him.  All  power  is  in  Him.  All  power  comes  out  from  Him 
as  He  is  allowed  free  play  in  our  lives ;  from  Him,  through  us, 
out  to  His  world.  ^ 

IF  To  talk  to  nominal  believers  on  the  subject  of  prayer  is 
generally  to  find  that  they  have  little  confidence  in  prayer  as  a 
power.  Do  they  believe  that  prayer  effects,  alters  anything  ? 
No,  for  nominal  Christianity  is  but  a  refined  naturalism ;  it 
wears  the  cross,  seeing  that  it  cannot  be  got  out  of  either  the 
Bible  or  the  Church,  as  an  ornament,  but  it  never  presses  it  to 
its  heart,  it  never  roots  its  life  beneath  its  shadow ;  it  is  to  it  a 
thing  extrinsic,  adventitious,  out  of  harmony  with  all  that  it 
really  believes  and  grows  to.  Nominalism  contains  within  it  no 
deep-seated  sense  of  sin,  of  need,  or  of  dependence ;  how  then 
can  it  lay  its  grasp  upon  the  great  co-related  truths  of  sacrifice, 
expiation,  mediation?  But  far  otherwise  is  it  with  him  who 
has  learnt  to  look  upon  himself  as  a  mortal  and  corruptible  being 
with  immortal  and  perfect  ends  ;  far  otherwise  with  him  who 
feels  himself  urged  towards  communion  with  the  Divine  through 
the  instinct  and  necessity  of  the  renewed  nature,  yet  unable 
from  a  felt  deficiency  in  that  nature  to  attain  to  such  a  com- 
munion without  help  from  the  Divine  itself !  Such  a  spirit  is 
prepared  to  look  beyond  itself  for  deliverance  and  for  aid ! 
*'How,"  asks  Chateaubriand,  "is  man  in  his  state  of  actual 
imperfection  to  attain  to  that  ideal  to  which  he  continually  tends  ? 
Some  will  say,  through  the  exertion  of  his  own  energy.  But 
there  is  a  manifest  disproportion  between  the  given  amount  of 
force  and  the  weight  it  has  to  remove.**  Hence  the  demand  for 
auxiliary  aids  to  human  weakness ;  hence  the  need  of  Christ,  of 
faith,  of  prayer,  "  the  dynamic  agency  of  heaven  ".^ 

My  hands  were  full  of  many  things. 

Which  I  did  precious  hold 
As  any  treasure  of  the  kings. 

Silver  or  gems  or  gold. 
The  Master  came  and  touched  my  hands, 

The  scars  were  in  His  own ; 
"  I  must  have  empty  hands,"  said  He, 
"  Wherewith  to  work  My  works  through  thee." 

»S.  D.  Gordon  TJie  Quiet  Time,  28.  »  Dora  Greenwell,  Essays,  126. 


THE  VALUE  OF  PRAYER  287 

My  hands  were  stained  with  marks  of  toil, 

Defiled  with  dust  of  earth. 
And  I  my  work  did  ofttimes  soil, 

And  render  little  worth. 
The  Master  came  and  touched  my  hands, 

And  crimson  were  His  own ; 
And  when  amazed  on  mine  I  gazed, 

Lo  !  every  stain  was  gone  ! 
**  I  must  have  cleansed  hands,"  said  He, 
"  Wherewith  to  work  My  works  through  thee." 

My  hands  were  growing  feverish. 

And  cumbered  with  much  care ; 
Trembling  with  haste  and  eagerness, 

Nor  folded  oft  in  prayer. 
The  Master  came  and  touched  my  hands, 

With  healing  in  His  own  : 
And  calm  and  still  to  do  His  will 

They  grew,  the  fever  gone. 
"  I  must  have  quiet  hands,"  said  He, 
"  Wherewith  to  work  My  works  through  thee." 

My  hands  were  strong  in  fancied  strength, 

But  not  in  power  Divine, 
And  bold  to  take  up  tasks  at  length — 

They  were  not  His,  but  mine. 
The  Master  came  and  touched  my  hands, 

And  mighty  were  His  own ; 
But  mine  since  then  have  powerless  been. 

Save  His  were  laid  thereon. 
"  And  it  is  only  thus,"  said  He, 
"That  I  can  work  My  works  through  thee." 


XIV. 
Hindrances  to  Prayer. 


19 


Literature. 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H.,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 

Augustine,  St.,  Confessions  (tr.  Montgomery,  1910). 

Barrett,  G.  S.,  The  Whole  Armour  of  God  (1905). 

Beecher,  H.  W.,  A  Book  of  Public  Prayer  (1892). 

Bernard,  St.,  Selections  (tr.  H.  Grimley,  1910). 

Black,  H.,  University  Sermons  (1908). 

Bonar,  A.  A.,  Wayside  Wells  (1908). 

Brierley,  J.,  Religion  and  To-Day  (1913). 

Carpenter,  W.  B.,  Thoughts  on  Prayer  (1907). 

Cuyler,  T.  L.,  Twenty-Two  Talks  (1902). 

How,  W.  W.,  Plain  Words,  iv.  (1901). 

Jones,  S.,  Now  and  Then  (1904). 

Knight,  G.  H.,  In  the  Secret  of  His  Presence  (1905). 

Lyttelton,  E.,  Studies  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  (1905). 

Power,  P.  B.,  The''I  Wills'*  of  the  Psalms  (1878). 

Pusey,  E.  B.,  Occasional  Sermons  (1884). 

Rolle,  R.,  The  Mending  of  Life  (ed.  Comper,  1914). 

Steven,  G.,  The  Psychology  of  the  Christian  Soul  (1911). 

Thomas,  H.  A.,  in  Faith  and  Criticism  (1893). 

Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 

Christian  World  Pulpit,  vii.  (1875)  306  (D.  Thomas). 


2go 


Hindrances  to  Prayer. 

1.  There  are  many  who  have  experienced  at  times  an  intense 
dissatisfaction  with  their  prayers.  They  seem  so  lame,  so  cold, 
so  profitless  that  they  are  inclined  to  exclaim,  "  What  a  weariness, 
what  a  mockery  it  is  !  "  They  are  constantly  disappointed  with 
themselves.  The  heart  that  seemed  so  full  has  run  empty  ere 
they  reached  their  knees.  They  have  nothing  to  say ;  all  their 
thoughts  have  fled  from  them ;  and  the  intense  longing  comes 
across  their  heart  that  some  one  would  teach  them  how  to  pray. 

^I  think  it  was  some  sense  of  dissatisfaction  with  their 
prayers  which  stole  into  the  hearts  of  the  disciples,  and  prompted 
the  petition — "Lord,  teach  us  to  pray".  The  sight  of  their 
praying  Master  doubtless  aroused  the  feeling.  As  they  saw  His 
earnestness,  His  faith,  and  how  many  things  He  had  to  lay  before 
His  Father,  they  craved  to  know  the  secret  of  that  spirit  of 
prayer.  They  contrasted  it,  in  their  own  minds,  with  their  own 
faint,  dead,  spiritless,  and  meagre  petitions ;  and  realized,  with  a 
vividness  they  never  felt  before,  how  grievously  defective  in  all 
the  features  of  true  prayer  were  their  own  lifeless  supplications.^ 

2.  Can  we  discern  any  of  the  causes  of  this  barrenness  in 
prayer  ?     We  may  find  some  help  if  we  consider  the  following  : — • 
(i)  Inattentiveness. 
(ii)  Preoccupation, 
(iii)  Doubt, 
(iv)  Pride, 
(v)  Selfishness. 

I. 

Inattentiveness. 

Take,  first,  wandering  thoughts.     Very  likely  our  thoughts 
wander  at  other  times  besides  during  our  prayers.     Very  likely 

^  W.  Boyd  Carpenter. 
291 


292     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

we  find  it  difficult  to  fix  them  steadily  upon  anything  we  want 
to  study  or  think  about  attentively.  We  have  suffered  ourselves 
to  fall  into  a  bad  intellectual  habit  of  inattention,  and  so  have 
lost  in  a  great  measure  the  power  of  fixing  the  mind  upon  any 
subject.  We  are  not  likely  to  be  able  to  fix  the  mind  upon  our 
prayers,  if  our  ordinary  habit  of  mind  is  thoughtless,  vague,  in- 
dolent, indifferent.  "  Whatsoever  thy  hand  findeth  to  do,  do  it 
with  thy  might "  is  a  rule  which  may  be  applied  with  equal  force 
to  the  mind  and  to  that  which  it  "  findeth  to  do  ".  Those  who  can 
at  all  times  fix  the  mind  upon  that  which  they  are  doing  have  a 
great  advantage  in  their  prayers. 

1.  The  very  act  of  controlling  the  thoughts,  of  composing  and 
concentrating  the  mind,  implies  often  a  strenuous  effort  of  the 
will  It  is  one  of  the  illusions  with  which  it  is  common  for  men 
to  flatter  themselves  that  they  are  masters  and  rulers  of  their 
own  minds.  They  fancy  they  can  think  about  what  they  please, 
and  when  they  please,  not  considering  the  curious  independence 
and  waywardness  of  that  strange  faculty  of  thought  which 
belongs  to  them,  and  which  seems  to  be  an  essential  part  of  their 
moral  being,  but  which  may  yet  be  said  to  have  a  life  and,  if  one 
may  go  so  far,  even  a  will  of  its  own.  For  the  truth  is  that  the 
mind  works  on  of  itself  without  asking  leave  of  us,  without  our 
help  and,  what  is  more  remarkable  still,  without  our  knowledge. 
That  this  is  so  in  our  dreams  is  apparent  to  everybody.  Is  it 
not  a  thing  that  is  always  surprising  us  afresh,  that  while  we 
have  been  asleep  our  minds  have  been  as  busy  as  ever,  working 
with  amazing  rapidity,  and  with  a  vigour  and  ingenuity  that 
betrayed  no  symptom  of  weariness  ?  Almost  in  a  moment  that 
fantastic  story-teller  has  woven  a  romance  out  of  the  slenderest 
materials,  a  mere  hint  from  a  physical  sensation,  or  a  fancy  that 
we  left  it  to  deal  with  as  it  chose,  when  we  sank  into  uncon- 
sciousness, or  a  sound  which  never  disturbed  our  slumber,  but  of 
which  it  failed  not  to  take  note,  and  which  summoned,  like  a 
fairy  horn,  all  the  strange  creatures  that  were  to  play  their  part 
on  the  mystic  stage.  We,  as  it  seemed,  had  nothing  to  do  with 
it  all.  We  lay  there  impassive,  at  rest.  It  was  not  we  who 
thought  out  those  astonishing  stories,  who  put  this  and  that 
together  in  the  laborious  and  deliberate  fashion  which  is  common 


HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER  293 

to  us  in  our  waking  hours,  when  we  try  to  please  a  child  by 
telling  him  a  tale.  It  was  the  mind  that  built  up  that  visionary 
fabric,  not  we  ourselves. 

And  what  happens  when  we  are  asleep  happens  also,  in  a 
measure,  when  we  are  awake.  Is  it  we  who  control  our  thoughts 
all  the  day  long  ?  Is  it  not  rather  our  thoughts  that  control  us  ? 
The  mind  pursues  its  own  course.  It  responds,  not  waiting  for 
permission  but  through  the  operation  of  its  own  laws,  to  the 
stimulus  which  it  is  constantly  receiving  through  the  senses.  It 
is  drawn  this  way  by  some  chance  suggestion  from  without,  or 
driven  that  way  by  some  impulse  from  within.  And  the  conse- 
quence is  that  often  we  have  no  idea  what  it  is  that  we  are  think- 
ing of  until,  suddenly,  we  become  aware  of  the  regions  into  which 
we  are  being  carried,  and  are  filled  with  shame  that  we  should 
permit  the  mind  to  be  occupying  itself,  as  we  express  it,  with 
such  matters.  So  independent  is  the  mind  of  man.  And  how 
stubborn  it  is,  how  rebellious.  Let  any  one  try  to  "fix  his 
mind"  on  any  subject  he  may  select;  what  hard  work  it  is 
unless  long  practice  has  made  it  easy.  The  mind  refuses  to  be 
fixed.  It  will  not  come  when  it  is  called,  or  if  it  comes  it  will  not 
stay.  It  is  busy  painting  pictures  and  does  not  like  being  dis- 
turbed. It  has  run  far  on  into  the  future,  and  has  no  inclination 
to  return,  at  its  owner's  call,  to  the  prosaic  present.  Or  it  has 
escaped  again  into  some  happy  past,  or  it  is  indolent  and  languid, 
and  does  not  wish  to  be  roused.  This  is  a  familiar  trouble,  and 
it  is  easy  to  see  how  it  makes  it  often  very  difficult  for  us  to 
pray.  We  try  to  collect  our  thoughts,  but  they  are  scattered 
again  as  soon  as  they  are  collected.  It  is  as  though  we  were 
rolling  a  huge  stone  up  a  steep  ascent.  We  can  make  it  move  a 
little  by  dint  of  great  exertion,  but  it  slips  back  the  moment  our 
efforts  are  relaxed.  We  try  to  follow  the  prayers  in  church.  We 
try  honestly,  and  we  succeed — for  how  long  ?  Alas  !  before  ever 
we  are  aware,  this  restless  mind  has  flitted  away,  and  travelled 
far  to  some  world  with  which  we  had  no  present  concern,  but  in 
which  it  has  promptly  made  itself  at  home.  It  is  in  the  counting 
house ;  it  is  in  the  cricket  field ;  it  is  anywhere  but  in  the  church. 
We  try  to  pray  in  private.  We  begin  with  what  may  seem  to  be 
genuine  prayer,  that  is,  we  begin  by  saying  what  we  feel,  or  what 
we  are  really  thinking.    But  how  often  the  humiliating  discovery 


294     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

is  made  that  in  some  unguarded  moment  the  mind  has  stolen  off 
on  some  business  of  its  own,  and  left  us  there  on  our  knees  re- 
peating phrases  that  mean  nothing,  offering  formal  petitions  that 
run  glibly  off  the  tongue  from  the  force  of  habit,  but  have  in  them 
no  life,  no  soul,  no  value,  no  significance  whatever.  As  Faber 
sings : — 

The  world  that  looks  so  dull  all  day- 
Glows  bright  on  me  at  prayer, 
And  plans  that  ask  no  thought  but  then 
Wake  up  and  meet  me  there. 

IT  Attention  is  an  effect,  and  you  cannot  have  an  effect  without 
its  cause.  Is  it  not  sacrifice,  then,  that  is  to  say,  is  it  not  love, 
that  lies  at  the  root  of  attention  ?  Consider  your  own  case  :  did 
you  ever  experience  any  difficulty  in  attending  to  what  you  loved  ? 
Is  it  not  significant,  for  instance,  that  a  person  who  loves  another 
is  said  to  pay  attention  ?  Think,  too,  of  little  children,  how  care- 
less and  inattentive  they  will  sometimes  be  at  their  work  one 
moment,  and  how  devoted  they  will  be  to  their  play  the  next.^ 

IT  Truly  then  we  pray  well  when  we  think  of  no  other  thing, 
but  all  our  mind  is  dressed  to  heaven  and  our  soul  is  enflamed 
with  the  fire  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  Thus  truly  a  marvellous  plen- 
teousness  of  God's  goodness  is  found  in  us ;  for  from  the  innermost 
marrow  of  our  hearts  shall  the  love  of  God  rise,  and  all  our 
prayer  shall  be  with  desire  and  effect ;  so  that  we  over-run  not 
the  words,  but  nearly  every  syllable  with  a  great  cry  and  desire 
we  shall  offer  to  our  Lord,  Our  heart  being  kindled  with  hot 
fire  our  prayer  is  also  kindled,  and  in  the  savour  of  sweetness  is 
offered  by  our  mouth  in  the  sight  of  God,  so  that  it  is  great  joy 
to  pray.  For  whiles  in  prayer  a  marvellous  sweetness  is  given 
to  the  one  praying,  the  prayer  is  changed  to  song.^ 

2.  But  thought  can  be  controlled  by  will.  If  it  were  not  so, 
St.  Paul  would  never  have  written,  "  Whatsoever  things  are  true, 
whatsoever  things  are  honourable,  whatsoever  things  are  just, 
whatsoever  things  are  pure,  whatsoever  things  are  lovely,  what- 
soever things  are  of  good  report ;  if  there  be  any  virtue,  and  if 
there  be  any  praise,  think  on  these  things  ".  Concentration  of 
thought  on  prayer  is  hindered  not  only  by  careless  thinking  of 
God  and  eternal  realities,  but  by  inattentive  habits  in  regard  to 

1  Spencer  Jones,  Now  a?id  Then,  121. 

2  Richard  RoUe,  The  Mending  of  Life  (ed.  Comper),  220. 


HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER  295 

any  subject.  Life  is  a  whole,  and  the  ordinary  frame  of  the 
daily  life  will  be,  practically,  the  mood  of  the  hour  of  prayer. 
"  Learn  to  give  your  whole  mind,"  it  has  been  truly  said,  "  to 
whatever  you  are  doing,  to  the  book  you  are  reading,  the  letter 
you  are  writing,  nay,  even  to  the  sweeping  of  a  room,  or  the 
making  of  a  garment." 

IT  When  thou  shalt  have  entered  the  church  for  prayer  or 
praise,  leave  outside  the  tumult  of  wavering  thoughts,  and  be 
inwardly  forgetful  of  all  care  as  to  outer  matters,  so  that  thou 
mayest  be  free  to  devote  thyself  to  God  alone.  For  it  is  not  pos- 
sible that  there  should  at  any  time  talk  with  God  one  who  at  the 
same  time  is  also  silently  chatting  with  the  whole  world.  Give 
attention,  therefore,  to  Him  who  giveth  attention  to  thee.  Listen 
to  Him  as  He  speaketh  to  thee,  that  He  Himself  may  hear  thee 
when  thou  speakest  to  Him.  It  will  thus  happen  that  if  thou 
assistest  at  the  utterance  of  Divine  praises  with  due  reverence 
and  thoughtfulness,  if  thou  hearkenest  intently  and  diligently  to 
every  word  of  Holy  Scripture,  thou  wilt  hear  God  speak  to  thee. 
Not  that  I  say  that  I  do  these  things ;  but  I  wish  to  do  them ;  I 
grieve  at  not  having  done  them ;  I  am  vexed  when  I  do  them 
not.  But  do  thou  to  whom  greater  grace  is  granted,  with  vows 
and  devout  prayer  turn  towards  thyself  the  merciful  ears  of  the 
Lord ;  with  tears  and  sighs  beseech  Him  to  look  with  clemency 
on  thy  wanderings  from  faithfulness,  and  with  spiritual  beings 
praise  and  glorify  Him  in  all  His  works.  For  nothing  more 
pleaseth  the  citizens  on  high,  nothing  giveth  more  joy  to  the 
Heavenly  King.^ 

3.  There  are,  no  doubt,  some  people  with  whom  the  difficulty 
of  any  sustained  effort  in  prayer  rises  from  a  natural  and  con- 
stitutional incapacity  for  any  prolonged  concentration  of  thought. 
Such  need  to  be  reminded  that  God  "  knoweth  whereof  we  are 
made,"  and  that,  as  He  does  not  ignore  our  natural  temperament, 
so  we  do  well  in  fully  recognizing  it.  Where  this  is  a  trouble  to 
us,  it  is  well  to  shorten  the  actual  time  spent  on  any  single  occa- 
sion in  devotional  exercises,  and,  if  possible,  to  multiply  the  occa- 
sions, and  all  the  more  frequently  pour  out  our  souls  before  God. 
Only  a  few  minutes,  or  even  moments,  of  really  earnest  and 
purposeful  prayer  are  certainly  of  more  spiritual  value  than  a 
comparatively  lengthy  period  consumed  in  listlessness.     It  is  only 

1  St.  Bernard, 


296    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

self-deception  when  we  quiet  our  conscience  by  trying  to  persuade 
ourselves  that  we  have  been  praying,  when  really  we  have  only 
been  kneeling.  Better  far  to  recognize  and  admit  our  constitu- 
tional infirmity,  and,  without  yielding  to  it,  none  the  less  take 
special  measures  to  discount  its  adverse  influence,  rather  than 
court  discouragement  by  persistently  attempting  to  accomplish 
what  our  natural  disposition  renders  almost  an  impossibility. 

IT  If  "  the  archers  "  disturb  us  as  soon  as  we  approach  the 
well,  so  that  we  seem  unable  to  slake  our  thirst,  we  may  do  well 
to  think  upon  those  words  of  St.  Paul's  which  embody  something 
more  valuable  than  a  fanciful  Hebrew  tradition,  "  They  drank  of 
that  spiritual  Rock  that  followed  them;  and  that  Rock  was 
Christ  ".  That  the  Rock  followed  the  Hebrews  on  their  wilder- 
ness journey  is  a  poetical  fiction,  but  that  the  spiritual  Rock  does 
follow  us  in  our  lifelong  journey,  ever  there  within  our  reach,  is 
a  supremely  blessed  fact ;  and  where  He  is,  even  *'  in  the  wilder- 
ness shall  waters  break  out  and  streams  in  the  desert  ".^ 

II. 

Preoccupation. 

1.  This  is  often  found  a  very  serious  hindrance  to  prayer. 
Take  such  a  case  as  a  young  mother  with  her  little  child.  Her 
intense  absorbing  love  for  it  fills  her  soul.  She  kneels  down  to 
pray.  She  can  pray  for  her  little  one.  She  can  thank  God  for 
it.  But  when  she  tries  to  pray  for  other  things,  straightway  her 
thoughts  fly  back  to  it.  She  cannot  banish  the  remembrance  of 
it  even  for  a  few  minutes.  She  is  frightened  at  the  discovery. 
"  Is  not  this  idolatry  ?  "  she  asks  in  terror.  Surely  she  loves  her 
child  far  better  than  she  loves  God.  Yes ;  in  one  way.  She  does 
love  her  child  with  the  wonderful  power  and  intensity  of  a 
mother's  love.  She  would  die  for  it.  But  she  cannot  love  God 
with  that  wonderful  mother's  love.  God  gave  it  her  not  for 
Himself  but  for  her  child.  So  let  her  not  be  frightened  at  it. 
But  let  her  none  the  less  pray  that  she  may  not  make  her  child 
her  God.  Let  her  seek  very  earnestly  from  God  the  power  to 
turn  her  soul  from  her  child  to  Him  in  simple,  lowly  devotion,  or 
there  may  be  peril  in  her  beautiful  mother  love.  Look  again  at 
one  who  has  some  scheme  which  fills  his  thoughts  and  interests. 

^  Canon  Hay  Aitken,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer,  299. 


HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER  297 

A  man  is  building  a  new  house,  and  planning  his  garden.  He 
can  think  of  little  else.  It  is  natural  enough  he  should  be  greatly 
interested  in  his  plans.  But  then  they  will  come  into  his  mind 
when  he  is  at  his  prayers.  This  is  a  great  snare,  and  needs  much 
resolution  and  many  struggles.  It  matters  not  what  the  care  or 
the  interest  is,  it  must  not  be  allowed  to  get  between  the  soul 
and  God.  It  must  be  made  a  subject  of  special  prayer  that  it 
may  not  do  so, 

!l  And  my  life  is  filled  with  such  things,  and  my  sole  hope  is 
in  Thy  great  mercy.  For  if  our  heart  becomes  occupied  with 
things  of  this  kind,  by  a  whole  host  of  vanities,  then  our  prayers 
are  often  interrupted  and  disturbed  by  such  thoughts,  and  when  we 
are  in  Thy  presence,  when  we  are  directing  the  voice  of  the  heart 
to  Thine  ear,  that  great  business  is  suddenly  broken  in  upon  by 
an  inrush  of  trifling  imaginations.^ 

IT  If  you  would  guard  against  wandering  in  prayer,  you  must 
practise  yourself  in  keeping  a  check  upon  your  thoughts  at  other 
times.  If,  as  Scripture  saith  of  the  fool,  our  '*  eyes  are  in  the 
ends  of  the  earth,"  if  we  let  our  senses  wander  after  everything 
which  presents  itself  to  them,  we  are  forming  in  ourselves  a  habit 
of  distraction,  which  will  oppress  us  in  our  prayers  too.  It  is  not 
a  light  matter  that  we  be  gazing  on  everything  which  we  can  see, 
that  we  listen  to  all  we  may  hear,  that  we  keep  all  the  avenues 
of  our  senses  open,  and  let  what  will  enter  in.  Rather  Holy 
Scripture  so  often  says,  '*  They  lift  up  their  eyes,"  as  if  we  should 
not  for  ever  be  gazing  around  us,  but  keep  them  rather  staid, 
until  we  need  them.  The  compass  of  our  mind  is  narrow  at 
best,  and  cannot  hold  many  things ;  one  thing  thrusts  out  another ; 
and  if  we  admit  these  manifold  things  into  our  mind,  we  shall 
have  small  room  for  its  true  and  rightful  Owner  and  Inmate, 
God.  If  we  let  thoughts  chase  each  other  through  our  minds  at 
will,  they  will  find  their  accustomed  entrance  there  in  our  prayers 
too ;  if  we  close  not  the  doors  of  our  minds  against  them  at  other 
times,  they  will  stand  wide  open  then.^ 

2.  Yet  prayer  offered  to  God  is  wholly  without  meaning 
unless  distractions  are  kept  from  the  mind.  Our  experience 
testifies  to  this.  Nothing  is  so  difficult  as  to  secure  the  mind 
from  distracting  thoughts  during  prayer,  but  no  one  tries  to  pray 
without  trying  to  do  this  difficult  and  discouraging  thing  all  the 

^  St.  AuguBtine.  '^  E.  B.  Pusey,  Occasional  Sermons,  127. 


298     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

time,  evidently  under  the  conviction  that  thoughts  which  inter- 
rupt communion  with  God  utterly  destroy  prayer ;  and  if  men 
fail  in  keeping  free  from  distractions,  sooner  or  later  they  cease 
to  try  to  pray. 

IF  And  let  him  never  give  over  because  of  evil  thoughts,  even 
if  they  are  sprung  upon  him  in  the  middle  of  his  prayer,  for  the 
devil  so  vexed  the  holy  Jerome  even  in  the  wilderness.  But  all 
these  toils  of  soul  have  their  sure  reward,  and  their  just  recom- 
pense set  out  for  them.  And  I  can  assure  you,  as  one  who  knows 
what  she  is  saying,  that  one  single  drop  of  water  out  of  God's 
living  well  will  both  sustain  you  and  reward  you  for  another  day 
and  another  night  of  your  life  of  life-long  prayer.^ 

III. 
Doubt. 

1.  Doubt  of  Divine  love  is  a  still  more  serious  hindrance.  It 
may  be  doubt,  not  of  God's  love  generally,  but  of  that  love  as 
directed  to  ourselves  personally.  Hiding  of  the  Father's  face  is 
bitterness  to  the  soul ;  and  when  doubts  come  in  upon  the  soul 
which  hide  out  the  sense  of  God's  love,  the  overwhelming  waters 
may  be  said  to  have  begun  to  break  over  our  heads.  Such 
doubts  have  come  terribly  upon  many  who  are  plainly  people  of 
God ;  they  have  rolled  in  one  after  another  upon  the  heart,  until 
at  length  they  have  brought  with  them  actual  despair ;  and  all 
that  the  poor  tempest-tossed  believer  could  do,  was  just  to  utter 
such  words  as  those  of  the  Psalmist,  "  Lead  me  to  the  rock  that  is 
higher  than  I ". 

IF  A  Christian  man  who  had  served  God  for  a  lifetime  was 
seized  with  consumption.  The  repeated  visits  of  the  attending 
minister  seemed  to  afford  no  consolation,  and,  in  truth,  all  the 
ordinary  means  of  comforting  were  tried  in  vain.  Thus  matters 
went  on  for  a  long  time,  and  at  length  the  invalid  went  abroad 
for  the  winter.  At  the  end  of  the  winter  he  returned,  and  the 
minister  having  heard  that  he  continued  in  the  same  state  of 
mind  as  before,  held  back  from  visiting  him.  The  invalid,  how- 
ever, desired  to  partake  of  the  Holy  Communion,  and  so  his 
pastor  went  to  him.  It  was  a  very  painful  scene  ;  the  agitation 
of  this  poor  afflicted  Christian  was  such  that  all  present  were 
greatly  distressed.     For  many  weeks  did  he  linger,  the  minister 

^  Santa  Teresa. 


HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER  299 

now  visiting  him  regularly  as  before,  but  the  same  distressing 
doubts  continued  ;  and  to  all  human  appearance,  they  were  likely 
to  shroud  him,  even  in  his  departure.  The  mercy  of  God,  how- 
ever, at  length  dispelled  the  gloom.  One  night  the  sick  man 
asked  for  his  dressing  things,  and  washed  and, shaved  himself ; 
then  he  asked  for  a  clean  shirt,  and  when  he  put  it  on,  and  was 
set  up  in  the  bed,  he  said,  "Now  I  am  dressed  for  my  last 
journey  "  ;  thus  he  remained  for  a  couple  of  hours,  when  lo  !  all 
clouds  and  mists  rolled  from  before  his  eyes,  the  light  of  heaven 
shone  in  upon  him,  a  ray  of  brightness  streamed  through  the 
golden  gates  upon  his  soul,  and  he  departed  full  of  joy.^ 

2.  The  will  has  a  large  part  to  play  in  meeting  this  trial.  It 
must  control  imagination  by  enlisting  it  on  the  side  of  God,  "  as 
the  ally  and  enlightener  and  support  of  faith  "  ;  it  must  forbid 
the  thought  that,  because  we  do  not  feel  that  God  is  with  us,  He 
who  said,  "  I  the  Lord  change  not,"  has  withdrawn  from  us ;  it 
must  lead  mind  and  heart  to  centre  themselves  not  on  self  but  on 
God.  When,  at  Horeb,  the  "still  small  voice  "  roused  Elijah  out 
of  thought  concentrated  too  much  on  himself  to  the  work  of  God, 
which  should  be  handed  on  in  unbroken  continuity  to  others,  the 
old  energy  returned. 

IT  In  that  brightest  of  books,  the  Introduction  d  la  Vie  Ddvote^ 
S.  Francis  de  Sales,  who  in  early  life  had  endured  a  severe  trial 
of  religious  depression  and  mental  struggle,  wrote :  "If,  after 
all,  you  receive  no  comfort,  do  not  be  troubled,  however  great 
the  dryness,  but  continue  to  keep  yourself  in  a  devout  posture 
before  God.  How  many  courtiers  go  a  hundred  times  a  year 
into  the  prince's  presence-chamber,  without  hopes  of  speaking  to 
him,  but  only  to  be  seen  by  him,  and  pay  him  their  duty  ?  So 
ought  we,  my  dear  Philothea,  to  come  to  holy  prayer  purely  and 
simply  to  pay  our  duty,  and  testify  our  fidelity."  Equally  wise 
is  the  advice  of  Thomas  a  Kempis,  "  to  flee  to  humble  and  out- 
ward works :  and  refresh  thyself  with  good  actions ;  to  expect 
with  firm  confidence  the  coming  of  the  Lord  and  visitation  from 
above."  ..."  For  I  will  cause  thee  to  forget  thy  toils,  and  to 
enjoy  inward  quietness  ;  I  will  spread  before  thee  the  pleasant 
meadows  of  the  Scriptures  :  that  with  heart  enlarged  thou  mayest 
begin  to  run  the  way  of  my  commandments."  It  is  through  a 
trial  like  this,  as  through  deep  sorrow  in  other  ways,  that  we 
learn  to  "  bear  one  another's  burdens,"  and  to  find,  not  only  "  in 

1  P.  B.  Power,  The  "  I  Wills  "  of  the  Psalms,  207. 


300     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

the  pleasant  meadows  of  the  Scriptures,"  but  also  in  reliance  on 
the  intercessions  of  the  Church,  through  the  merits  of  its  Head, 
sources  of  comfort  and  refreshment  hitherto  unknown,  although 
so  close  to  us.^ 

3.  However  common  and  distressing  may  be  the  infirmity  of 
doubt,  it  is  exceedingly  simple  both  to  understand  and  to  deal 
with.  It  requires  only  the  application  of  common  sense  for  us 
to  see  that  we  know  enough  to  be  able  to  overcome  the  weakness 
by  degrees.  The  difficulty,  in  short,  solvitur  arnbulando  ;  as 
Archbishop  Temple  used  to  say,  "Is  it  impossible  ?  then  make  it 
possible  by  doing  it ".  No  revelation  from  God  is  needed  for  this 
purpose.  We  require  simply  (1)  to  pray  for  help  before  begin- 
ning ;  (2)  to  grasp  the  principles  of  prayer  as  taught  in  the  Lord's 
Prayer ;  (3)  the  discipline  of  practice  ;  (4)  patience  with  the 
slowness  of  our  progress  ;  (5)  perseverance  ;  (6)  to  recognize  that 
wrestling  effort  is  an  inherent  characteristic  of  prayer  in  the 
Bible,  from  Gen.  xxxii.  36  (Jacob  and  the  Angel)  to  the  word 
"strive"  in  Eph.  vi.  18,  and  Rev.  vi.  10;  (7)  to  remember  that 
genuine  dissatisfaction  in  such  a  matter  is  a  sign  of  life,  and 
common  to  all  prayerful  people ;  (8)  certainty  of  conviction  that 
the  promises  attached  to  earnest  effort  in  prayer  will  not  fail. 

^  The  mind  of  the  sincerest,  I  will  not  venture  to  say  of  the 
maturest,  for  that  I  am  not  competent  to  speak  of,  will  be  some- 
times, to  a  certain  degree,  less  luminous,  it  may  be,  beclouded ; 
the  question  will  be  then,  what  is  the  path  to  comfort  ?  I  say, 
and  say  with  all  my  soul,  .  .  .  prayer.  Prayer,  persevered  in, 
until  the  mind  is  sensibly  reinstated,  and  the  former  light  re- 
newed.^ 

IF "  I  fought  my  doubts,"  Sir  Thomas  Browne  says  in  the 
Religio  Medici,  "not  in  a  martial  posture,  but  on  my  knees." 

IV. 

Pride. 

1.  We  are  very  slow  to  learn  the  lesson  of  our  own  utter  in- 
ability.    Pride  is  a  very  dull  scholar  in  the  school  of  experience  ; 

1  A.  J.  Worlledge,  Prayer,  304. 

a  Correspondence  between  John  Jebb  and  Alexander  Ktiox,  ii.  140. 


HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER  301 

and  often  and  often  she  will  beat  about,  seeking  for  every  pos- 
sible excuse  for  the  failure  of  which  she  herself  is  the  sole  cause. 
We  feel  at  some  time,  perhaps,  that  our  hearts  are  prompted  by 
an  earnest  desire  to  pray.  We  become  for  the  moment  keenly 
alive  to  our  own  wants ;  but  when  we  attempt  to  pray,  we  find 
the  edge  of  that  sense  of  need  is  gone.  The  heart  appears  full, 
but  when  we  kneel  we  find  it  empty.  Like  Tantalus  of  old,  we 
anticipate  a  rich  draught  of  the  brimming  flood ;  but  as  we  stoop 
to  drink,  it  is  gone.  Vexed  and  disappointed  we  murmur  at 
our  privation,  but  are  too  blind  to  see  its  cause.  We  cannot  see 
that  our  own  self-conceit  lies  at  the  root  of  our  failure.  We 
think  we  can  do  it  of  ourselves — we  anticipate  rich  heart  com- 
munion ;  but  we  are  miserably  mistaken,  because  we  do  not  realize 
that  we  are  not  sufficient  of  ourselves  to  think  anything  as  of 
ourselves,  but  that  our  whole  sufficiency  is  of  God.  We  forget 
that  it  is  ever  true,  and  must  continue  to  be  the  heart  experience 
of  all  the  sons  of  God  till  the  end  of  time,  that  we  know  not 
what  we  should  pray  for  as  we  ought.  We  forget  that,  for  real, 
successful  prayer,  a  Divine  energy  of  prayer  must  quicken  our 
hearts ;  that  the  Holy  Spirit  of  God  must  help  our  infirmities,  mak- 
ing intercession  for  us  with  groanings  which  cannot  be  uttered. 

IF  A  full  hand  cannot  take  Christ.^ 

H  It  is  very  significant  that  in  Solomon's  catalogue  of  "  six 
things  which  the  Lord  hateth,  yea,  seven  which  are  an  abomina- 
tion unto  him,"  the  very  foremost  place  is  given  to  what  few 
men  would  consider  a  sin  at  all — "  a  proud  look,  a  lying  tongue, 
hands  that  shed  innocent  blood,  a  heart  that  deviseth  wicked 
imaginations,  feet  that  are  swift  to  run  to  mischief,  a  false  witness 
that  speaketh  lies,  and  he  that  soweth  discord  among  brethren  ". 
A  black  catalogue  that !  most  of  them  sins  that  all  men  will 
condemn,  and  of  which  most  men  would  be  ashamed.  But  at  the 
very  head  of  the  list  stands  the  "  proud  look  " ;  and  as  there  can- 
not be  a  proud  look  unless  there  is  a  proud  heart  behind  it,  it  is 
the  hidden  pride  of  heart  that  here  is  stamped  with  the  foremost 
reprobation  of  God.^ 

2.  We  are  much  inclined  to  self-dependence.  We  would  do 
God's  work  without  God's  help.     In  our  church  capacity  we  have 

1  A.  A.  Bonar,  Wayside  Wells,  177. 

^G.  H.  Knight,  In  the  Secret  of  His  Presence,  62. 


302     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

sometimes,  as  we  think,  knowledge  and  wisdom,  and  skill,  and 
plans,  and  organizations,  and  numbers,  and  pecuniary  resources, 
and  we  are  tempted  to  trust  to  these ;  and  in  our  more  private 
and  personal  capacity  we  are  ready  so  to  think  of  what  we  can 
do,  and  of  what  we  will  do,  as  to  overlook  what  God  must  do. 
We  go  to  God's  own  work  as  if  it  were  altogether  man's  work. 
We  engage  in  it  in  a  spirit  of  self-dependence.  But  when  we  do 
Christian  work,  we  are  not  only  dependent  upon  God ;  it  is  in- 
dispensable also  that  we  should  exercise  that  dependence,  that  we 
should  express  it  in  prayer.  This  is  as  much  a  condition  of  His 
co-operation  with  us  as  is  the  use  of  the  power  which  He  has 
committed  to  our  hands.  He  gives  of  His  Spirit  to  those  that 
ask  Him,  and  He  gives  of  His  Spirit  in  the  measure  that  they 
ask  for  that  Spirit.  He  who  feels  that  he  is  quite  equal  to  the 
Christian  work  to  which  he  is  called  is  left  by  God  to  his  own 
resources.  When  we  are  strong  then  are  we  weak  ;  when  we  are 
weak  then  are  we  strong,  for  then  it  is  that  by  faith  and  prayer 
we  unite  ourselves  to  the  strength  of  God.  We  are  to  use  our 
own  power  in  the  Christian  service,  and  then  we  are  to  put  our 
trust  in  God's  power ;  we  are  to  do  what  we  can,  and  when  we 
have  done  what  we  can,  we  are  to  look  and  see  what  God  will  be 
pleased  to  do. 

IF  James  and  John  once  came  to  Jesus  and  made  to  Him  the 
amazing  request  that  He  would  place  one  of  them  on  His  right 
hand  and  the  other  on  His  left  hand  when  He  set  up  His  imperial 
government  at  Jerusalem  !  As  long  as  these  self-seeking  disciples 
sought  only  their  own  glory,  Christ  could  not  give  the  askings 
of  their  ambitious  hearts.  By-and-by,  when  their  hearts  had 
been  renewed  by  the  Holy  Spirit,  and  they  had  become  so  con- 
secrated to  Christ  that  they  were  in  complete  harmony  with  Him, 
they  were  not  afraid  to  pour  out  their  deepest  desires.  James 
declares  that,  if  we  do  not  "  ask  amiss,"  God  will  "  give  liberally  ". 
John  declares  that  "  whatsoever  we  ask,  we  receive  of  him,  be- 
cause we  keep  his  commandments,  and  do  those  things  that  are 
pleasing  in  his  sight ".  Just  as  soon  as  those  two  Christians 
found  their  supreme  happiness  in  Christ  and  His  cause  they  re- 
ceived the  desires  of  their  hearts.^ 

3.  For  true  balance  of  character  and  to  produce  the  best  work 
in  any  line,  it  is  necessary  for  a  man  to  have  both  humility  and 

1  T.  L.  Cuyler,  Twenty-Two  Talks,  60. 


HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER  303 

also  self-confidence.  There  is  a  false  humility  which  weakens  a 
man  and  unfits  him  for  the  duties  of  life.  It  is  often  indistin- 
guishable from  moral  cowardice,  a  refusal  to  put  forth  the  best 
powers,  a  slackness  of  moral  tissue  which  may  be  as  fatal  a  form 
of  self-indulgence  as  any  other  form  of  it. 

As  there  is  a  false  humility  which  spoils  character  and  work, 
so  there  is  an  over- weening  conceit  which  is  equally  weak,  and 
which  keeps  a  man  from  his  true  place  of  usefulness.  An  ex- 
aggerated sense  of  personal  importance,  an  inordinate  ambition 
for  the  first  place,  an  egotism  which  judges  of  everything  accord- 
ing as  it  affects  that  sweet  gentleman  self,  a  self-pushing,  self- 
advertising  spirit  which  will  not  enter  into  anything  unless  self 
is  to  be  the  first  dog  in  the  hunt — that  is  the  other  extreme. 

IT  There  are  many  cheap  and  exaggerated  reputations  in  the 
world ;  but  I  am  not  sure  but  that  the  reputation  for  humility 
may  not  be  the  cheapest  of  them  all  in  some  cases.  To  get  it, 
you  only  need  to  lie  low,  and  say  nothing,  and  never  take  an 
independent  stand.  No  useful  work  is  possible  from  the  man 
who  is  so  mistrustful  of  himself  that  he  will  not  even  try.^ 

V. 

Selfishness. 

A  spirit  of  selfishness  in  prayer  will  lead  to  the  sense  of 
barrenness.  By  selfishness  in  prayer  is  meant  that  spirit  in 
prayer  which  confines  all  our  supplications  to  our  own  individual 
need.  It  is  not  that  we  do  not  include  by  name  many  of  our 
friends  and  relatives  within  the  circle  of  our  prayers.  Of  course 
we  all  of  us  do  this.  But  even  when  we  do  so,  is  it  not  often 
done  in  a  perfunctory  way  ?  Is  not  the  spirit  which  yearns  over 
them  very  far  removed  from  us  ?  Is  there  the  presence  of  that  feel- 
ing of  the  Apostle,  who  described  himself  as  travailing  in  birth- 
pangs  for  those  in  whose  hearts  he  desired  to  see  Christ  formed  ? 
And  God  often  visits  us  with  barrenness  because  we  fail  to  grow 
in  heart-sympathy  and  Christian  longing  for  the  welfare  of  others. 
It  is  the  very  law  of  Christ  that  His  love  should  spread,  as  it  is 
the  law  of  hydrostatics  that  pressure  should  circulate  in  all  direc- 
tions through  a  volume  of  water ;  and  when  we  in  a  niggardly 

^  Hugh  Black,  University  Sermons,  70. 


304     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

forgetfulness  of  others  violate  that  law,    we  are  met  with  the 
punishment  of  a  straitening  in  ourselves. 

IF  Is  there  any  heaven  surpassing  in  its  sheer  blessedness  that 
which  John  Masefield  in  The  Everlasting  Mercy  has  described  as 
flashing  into  a  humble,  seeking  soul : — 

I  knew  that  Christ  had  given  me  birth 

To  brother  all  the  souls  on  earth, 

And  every  bird  and  every  beast 

Should  have  the  crumbs  broke  at  the  feast.  ^ 

1.  How  shall  we  guard  ourselves  against  the  sin  of  selfishness 
in  prayer?  Just  as  we  guard  ourselves  against  unreality  or 
formality  in  prayer — by  going  out  into  the  battle  to  fight  for  God. 
He  who  is  most  earnest  and  active  in  labour  to  win  souls  to 
Christ  is  sure  to  be  most  earnest  in  prayer  for  them.  The 
surest  remedy  for  selfishness  is  to  give  a  man  something  to  do 
for  others;  and  so  it  is  with  prayer.  As  regards  intercessory 
prayer,  one  important  matter  is  to  have  a  great  deal  to  pray 
about,  and  that  we  shall  find  in  active  service  for  God. 

IF  The  whole  matter  is  in  a  nut-shell.  That  prayer  is  the 
most  acceptable  which  leaves  the  best  results.  Results,  I  mean, 
in  actions.  That  is  true  prayer.  Not  certain  gusts  of  softness 
and  feeling,  and  nothing  more.^ 

2.  Selfishness  in  prayer  besets  particularly  Christians  who 
are  advanced  in  religious  life,  and  to  whom  prayer  has  become  a 
constant  or  at  least  a  frequent  exercise.  This  danger  is  one  that 
belongs  especially  to  intense  natures ;  but  all  natures  are  more 
or  less  subject  to  it.  We  should  be  in  such  sympathy  with  God 
that  we  should  have  much  to  pray  for  touching  the  honour  and 
glory  of  His  name ;  we  should  be  in  such  sympathy  with  Divine 
Providence  that  we  should  have  much  to  offer  thanksgiving  for, 
in  the  events  that  every  day  transpire  round  about  us ;  and  we 
should  be  in  such  sympathy  with  our  fellow-men  that  we  should 
find  in  their  wants  much  subject-matter  for  petition. 

IF  I  have  often  been  suspicious  of  people  who  have  come  to 
me  saying  that  they  had  made  some  specific  subject  a  matter  of 
prayer,  and  had  been  told  by  God  what  to  do.     I  have  feared 

J  J.  Brierley,  Belig%(m  and  To-Day,  252.  ^  Santa  Teresa. 


HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER  305 

that  instead  of  praying  to  God  to  clarify  their  mental  vision,  and 
deliver  them  from  the  selfishness  that  might  warp  their  judg- 
ment, they  have  prayed  until  they  were  able  to  persuade  them- 
selves that  the  thing  they  wanted  to  do  was  right.  And  I  can 
remember  cases  in  which  the  results  were  very  sad.  How  liable 
we  all  are  to  self-delusion,  and  to  the  running  into  extremes ! 
No  doubt  there  are  times  when  a  man,  finding  himself  unable  to 
arrive  at  a  settled  judgment,  has  to  wait  for  the  openings  and 
leadings  of  God's  providence.^ 

IF  Spiritual  writers  sometimes  speak  of  "  a  ladder  of  prayer," 
by  which  they  mean  that  there  are  stages  in  the  grace  of  prayer 
through  which  a  man  passes  in  his  growth  in  the  spiritual  life. 
The  first  stage  in  prayer  with  most  of  us  was  possibly  a  cry  for 
escape  from  some  external  evil,  some  disease  or  disaster,  either 
of  our  own  or  of  one  dear  to  us.  There  will  follow  on  that  a  cry 
for  deliverance  from  sin,  or  for  forgiveness.  In  this  second  stage 
there  may  be  present  in  the  mind  a  fear  of  punishment  and  little 
more,  or  a  fear  of  exposure.  At  any  rate  the  man  is  in  both 
these  cases  dealing  with  God ;  he  has  come  into  God's  presence ; 
his  danger  or  his  sin  has  brought  him  there.  To  God  he  has  not 
come  perhaps  for  God's  sake,  but  only  for  his  own ;  still  he  has 
come,  and  that  is  much.  The  next  stage  is  a  prayer  for  virtue 
or  grace.  He  has  seen  the  worth  and  beauty  of  goodness,  and 
desires  it.  He  has  seen  it  in  the  life  of  some  man  or  woman,  or 
has  read  it  in  story ;  or  it  may  be  that  the  sight  of  it  has  arisen 
in  his  heart  as  if  through  inspiration ;  and  it  holds  him  as  by  a 
power  from  without.  He  now  prays  for  it,  and  prays  for  it  as 
the  chief  good  of  life.  He  asks  it  as  a  thing  desirable  for 
him  to  possess.  This  is  not  selfishness,  and  yet  there  is  in  it  a 
thought  of  the  self.  He  may  call  it  a  desire  for  that  self-realiza- 
tion which  in  a  true  sense  is  one  of  the  ends  of  his  existence ; 
he  is  seeking  that  which  is  best  for  him,  and  which  it  will  be 
best  for  the  world  (so  far  as  he  can  help  it)  that  he  should  become. 
But  nevertheless  there  is  present  in  the  thought  of  his  attaining 
the  grace  he  prays  for  the  thought  also  of  a  "  culture  "  into  which 
he  is  pressing.  The  next  stage  lifts  the  mind  away  from  any 
thought  of  self  at  all ;  it  is  a  desire  that  the  will  of  God  be  done. 
To  mortal  man,  however,  the  will  of  God  continually  presents 
itself  as  something  to  be  home  ;  a  trial  or  tribulation,  a  loss  irre- 

E arable,  a  sorrow  from  which  there  can  now  be  no  escape.     At  first 
e  prayed  that  it  might  not  come,  but  now  he  prays  that  he  have 
strength  to  bear  it.     And  that  not  in  the  meaning  that  the 

^John  Brash  :  Memorials  and  Correspondence ^  157. 
20 


3o6     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

sorrow  should  not  be  too  painful,  but  that  he  do  not  rebel  or 
murmur  against  the  wisdom  and  the  love  of  God  in  sending  it. 
The  other  thought  contained  in  the  prayer  that  the  will  of  God 
be  done  is  this :  that  he  take  up  the  will  of  God  into  his  own 
will,  and  make  it  his  life's  work  to  carry  it  through.  It  is  not 
presented  to  his  mind  as  a  commandment  coming  upon  him  from 
without,  but  as  an  end,  a  career,  a  vast  and  abiding  ambition 
that  God  prevail  and  God's  purpose  be  accomplished.  It  is  a 
great  thing,  the  greatest  thing  in  the  world  for  him  to  help  in 
this  grand,  this  age-long,  this  ever-conquering  purpose  of  God. 
It  is  perhaps  only  a  richer  strain  in  this  consecration  of  a  man's 
life  that  it  becomes  his  chief  joy ;  he  delights  and  revels  in  the 
carrying  of  this  ambition  out.  My  strength  and  refreshment  of 
soul,  he  says,  come  from  my  work  in  this.  '*  My  meat  is  to  do 
the  will  of  him  that  sent  me,  and  to  finish  his  work."  This  is 
the  spirit  in  which  the  mighty  things  in  the  world's  history  have 
been  achieved.  Men  in  the  heroic  times  did  not  think  of  them- 
selves at  all,  or  of  their  future,  or  even  of  their  soul's  salvation  ; 
they  thought  of  the  will  of  God,  and  the  necessity  that  they  do 
it  here  and  now,  and  at  any  cost.  For  this  the  Christian  prays. 
He  prays  that  this  will  be  done  without  any  regard  for  him  at 
all.  If  we  were  to  ask  him,  he  would  say  that  he  does  not 
believe  that  it  can  involve  his  final  destruction,  for  the  God 
whose  will  he  prays  may  be  done  is  a  God  of  love  who  will  some- 
how save  His  people.  But  in  his  prayer  he  is  not  thinking  of 
that,  but  of  something  vaster,  the  great  universe  of  men ;  and  he 
desires  that  God  take  His  own  way  whatever  it  may  mean  for 
him,  and  carry  His  will  through  at  any  cost  to  him.  Now,  there 
is  joy,  unspeakable  joy,  to  a  man  in  this  complete  emergence 
from  the  thought  of  himself;  and  that  joy  (as  we  see  from  the 
lives  of  some)  will  rise  up  to  a  note  of  triumph  in  the  contempla- 
tion of  the  final  victory  of  God  over  all  evil,  and  the  bringing  of 
all  His  children  home  at  last^ 

If  when  I  kneel  to  pray, 

With  eager  lips  I  say, 

"  Lord,  give  me  all  the  things  that  I  desire, 

Health,  wealth,  fame,  friends,  brave  heart,  religious  fire, 

The  power  to  sway  my  fellow-men  at  will. 

And  strength  for  mighty  works  to  banish  ill," 

In  such  a  prayer  as  this 

The  blessing  I  must  miss. 

1  George  Steven,  The  Psychology  of  the  Christian  Soul,  289. 


HINDRANCES  TO  PRAYER  307 

Or,  if  I  only  dare 

To  raise  this  fainting  prayer  : — 

"  Thou  seest,  Lord,  that  I  am  poor  and  weak, 

And  cannot  tell  what  things  I  ought  to  seek  ; 

I  therefore  do  not  ask  at  all,  but  still 

I  trust  Thy  bounty  all  my  wants  to  fill," 

My  lips  shall  thus  grow  dumb, 

The  blessing  shall  not  come. 

But,  if  I  lowly  fall, 
And  thus  in  faith  I  call : — 

"  Through  Christ,  O  Lord,  I  pray  Thee  give  to  me. 
Not  what  I  would,  but  what  seems  best  to  Thee, 
Of  life,  of  health,  of  service,  and  of  strength, 
Until  to  Thy  full  joy  I  come  at  length," 
My  prayer  shall  then  avail, 
The  blessincr  shall  not  fail. 


XV. 

Encouragements  to  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Binnie,  W.,  Serinons  (1887). 

Bonar,  A.  A.,  Wayside  Wells  (1908). 

Bounds,  E.  M.,  Purpose  in  Prayer  (1914). 

Clifford,  J.,  Social  Worship  (1899). 

Gore,  C. ,  Prayer,  and  the  Lord's  Prayer  (1898). 

Goulburn,  E.  M.,  The  Lord's  Prayer  (1898). 

Horton,  R.  F.,  The  Open  Secret  (1904). 

Irving,  Edward,  Collected  Writings,  iii.  (1865). 

Knox,  J.,  Works,  iii.  (1854)  91. 

McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 

Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

,,  „        Waymarks  in  the  Pursuit  of  Ood  (1908). 

Monrad,  D.  G.,  The  World  of  Prayer  (1879). 
Sclater,  J.  R.  P.,  The  Enterprise  of  Life  (1911). 
Simeon,  G„  IVorks,  iii.  (1837). 
Vaughan,  C.  J.,  Voices  of  the  Prophets  (1867). 
Westcott,  B.  F.,  Lessons  from  Work  (1901). 
Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 
Young,  D.  T.,  The  Enthusiasm  of  God  (1905). 


310 


Encouragements  to  Prayer. 

If  prayer  has  its  difficulties,  it  has  also  its  encouragements.  And 
there  is  no  better  way  of  solving  the  one  than  by  turning  to  the 
other.  Of  its  encouragements  the  promises  are  greatest  and  best. 
But  there  are  others.  Let  us,  first  of  all,  see  how  the  name  of 
God  is  revealed  as  an  encouragement  in  prayer. 

I. 

The  Name  of  God. 

The  promises  of  God  speaking  in  the  hearts  of  the  psalmists 
over,  possibly,  a  period  of  eight  centuries,  were  no  uncertain 
sounds,  no  dreams  which  vanish  "  when  one  awaketh,"  no  mirage 
of  the  desert  promising  refreshment  and  satisfaction  which  are 
illusory.  Attested  by  inward  experience,  they  have  been  fulfilled 
in  the  historic  fact  of  the  Incarnation,  and  the  consequent  com- 
munion and  fellowship  of  God  with  man,  and  man  with  man  in 
the  mystical  body  of  His  Son.  So  for  the  expression  of  their 
own  highest  Christian  convictions,  the  members  of  the  Catholic 
Church  have  from  generation  to  generation  used  their  inspired 
language.  Within  the  Divine  Society,  in  which  the  Holy  Spirit 
forms  "the  mind  of  Christ,"  teaching  us  to  pray  aright,  the 
Psalms  live  on,  supported  by  both  of  the  forms  of  testimony 
— derived  from  inward  experience  and  from  outward  history — 
which  are  needed  for  complete  assurance. 

Now  the  psalmists  knew  God  as  the  Living  One  ;  they  were 
stirred  to  praise  and  thank  Him  because  they  believed  not  only 
that  in  prayer  their  souls  were  in  contact  with  Him,  but  also  that 
He  delighted  in  such  contact ;  they  were  morally  certain  that 
He  meant  their  prayer  to  be  answered,  and,  through  the  answered 
prayer,  to  work  out  in  His  Church  and  each  faithful  member  of 
it  His  eternal  purposes.    To  His  attributes  their  appeal  is  constant 

3" 


312     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

as  a  reason  for  His  hearing  prayer  and  granting  our  requests. 
Thus  the  chief  among  all  prayers  for  pardon  is  based  upon  the 
revelation  of  the  Divine  character  granted  to  Moses  on  Mount 
Sinai : — 

'*  Have  mercy  upon  me,  O  God,  according  to  thy  lovingkindness : 
According  to  the  multitude  of  thy  tender  mercies  blot  out  my 
transgressions." 

The  ground  of  prayer  for  protection  is  discovered  in  the  same 
great  revelation  by  another  psalmist,  who  expects  that  God,  being 
in  character  what  He  declared  Himself  to  be,  will  be  gracious  to 
him,  and  show  him  "  a  token  for  good  ".  Another  appeals  in  a 
cry  for  forgiveness  and  restoration  to  the  Divine  attributes  of 
"  faithfulness  "  and  "  righteousness  "  as  a  reason  why  his  prayer 
should  be  answered  : — 

"  Hear  my  prayer,  0  Lord  ;  give  ear  to  my  supplications  : 
In  thy  faithfulness  answer  me,  and  in  thy  righteousness." 

Again,  in  the  intercession  of  Daniel  the  prophet  we  have  a 
signal  illustration  of  petitions  founded  on  this  warrant.  He 
"  understood  by  books  the  number  of  the  years,  whereof  the  word 
of  the  Lord  came  to  Jeremiah  the  prophet,  that  he  would  accom- 
plish seventy  years  in  the  desolations  of  Jerusalem  ".  But  the 
prophet  does  not  repose  his  trust  only  on  the  promise  ;  he  urges 
that  which  is  due  to  the  Divine  character :  "  Now  therefore,  O 
our  God,  hear  the  prayer  of  thy  servant,  and  his  supplications, 
and  cause  thy  face  to  shine  upon  thy  sanctuary  that  is  desolate, 
for  the  Lord's  sake.  O  my  God,  incline  thine  ear,  and  hear ; 
open  thine  eyes,  and  behold  our  desolations,  and  the  city  which 
is  called  by  thy  name :  for  we  do  not  present  our  supplications 
before  thee  for  our  righteousness,  but  for  thy  great  merciea  O 
Lord,  hear ;  O  Lord,  forgive ;  0  Lord,  hearken  and  do ;  defer 
not,  for  thine  own  sake,  O  my  God,  because  thy  city  and  thy 
people  are  called  by  thy  name." 

IL 

The  History  of  Israel. 

1.  The  history  of  Israel  is  compact  of  prayer.  "That  tide  of 
fire,  the  Assyrian  and  his  army,"  rolled  back  by  the  prayer  of 
the  prophet  Amos,  spoken  as  he  marked  the  slow  advance  of 


ENCOURAGEMENTS  TO  PRAYER       313 

the  coming  judgment,  "  O  Lord  God,  cease,  I  beseech  thee  :  how 
shall  Jacob  stand  ?  for  he  is  small,"  is  only  one  example  out  of 
many.  It  is,  indeed,  the  simple  truth  to  say  that  the  Hebrews 
have  taught  the  world  how  to  pray.  Prayer  is  an  instinct  of  the 
unsophisticated  soul.  Whether  to  gods  or  to  saints  or  to  demons 
or  the  dead,  all  nations  have  prayed.  But  the  prayers  differ  as 
the  religions  differ ;  and  as  the  Hebrews  are  the  world's  ac- 
knowledged masters  in  religion,  it  is  from  their  prayers  that  we 
have  by  far  the  most  to  learn.  "  Ye  shall  not  pray  as  the  Gentiles 
do."  Hebrew  prayer  itself  underwent  development,  and  the 
difference  that  Jesus  made  was  very  great;  but  it  is  still  to 
the  Bible,  to  the  Old  Testament  and  the  New  alike,  that  we 
must  go  when  we  would  learn  to  speak  with  God.  Old  Testa- 
ment aspirations  were  fulfilled  rather  than  abolished  by  Christ. 
The  piety  of  the  millennium  which  preceded  Him  has  a  value 
of  its  own,  and  a  value  even  for  us.  For  more  than  twenty 
centuries  men  have  lifted  up  their  hearts  to  God  in  the  words  of 
the  Hebrew  Psalter,  because  there  they  have  found  their  deepest 
thoughts  most  finely  interpreted  and  expressed ;  and  the  older 
the  world  grows,  the  more  profound  and  wonderful  seems  that 
prayer  which  Christ  taught  His  disciples.  These  things  can  never 
be  outgrown  or  superseded ;  they  are  eternal,  because  they  are 
simple  and  true.  We  know  not  how  to  pray  as  we  ought,  but 
the  Bible  may  be  our  teacher  and  guide.  For  prayer,  though  in 
its  nature  spontaneous,  may  be  directed;  though  an  instinct,  it 
may,  like  any  other  instinct,  be  trained.  "  One  of  his  disciples 
said  unto  him,  Lord,  teach  us  to  pray."  So  prayer  can  be  taught, 
and  the  modern  Church  has  much  to  gain  by  recalling  her  prayers 
to  the  Biblical  standard. 

2.  One  characteristic — perhaps  the  most  prominent  and  not- 
able of  all  the  characteristics  which  distinguish  the  Bible  prayers 
from  those  we  find  in  other  devotional  books — is  that  they  con- 
tain so  much  of  narrative.  We  observe  this  in  the  Psalms.  A 
large  proportion  of  these  call  to  remembrance  events  in  the  past 
history  of  Israel ;  and  certain  of  the  longest  are  historical  from 
beginning  to  end — historical,  be  it  observed,  without  ceasing  to 
be  really  prayers.  The  same  feature  is  found  in  the  prayers 
scattered  through  the  other  books  of  Scripture.     The  explanation 


314    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

is  not  far  to  seek.  God's  works,  next  to  His  Word,  are  the 
authentic  revelation  of  His  mind,  and  the  devout  commemora- 
tion of  them  is  fitted  to  strengthen  faith  exceedingly,  and  to 
encourage  in  prayer.  The  worshippers  beseech  the  Divine  help, 
because  it  has  already  in  the  past  been  so  signally  manifested ;  or 
they  offer  their  thanks  for  the  Divine  guidance  of  the  nation  in 
ages  long  gone  by  ;  or  they  look  at  the  sins  which  they  confess 
in  the  light  of  the  ancient  goodness  of  God,  of  which  they  have 
proved  themselves  so  miserably  unworthy.  But  the  striking 
thing  is  this  :  they  do  not  content  themselves  with  vague  asser- 
tions of  that  goodness ;  they  relate  it  definitely — sometimes 
briefly,  and  sometimes  very  elaborately — to  their  national  history. 
It  is  done  briefly,  but  characteristically,  by  Jehoshaphat  when,  in 
his  prayer  for  help  in  battle,  he  says,  "  Didst  not  thou,  O  our 
God,  drive  out  the  inhabitants  of  this  land  before  thy  people 
Israel,  and  gavest  it  to  the  seed  of  Abraham  thy  friend  for 
ever  ? "  Similarly,  Judas  Maccabaeus,  before  a  battle,  begins  his 
prayer  for  victory  thus :  "  O  Saviour  of  Israel,  who  didst  quell 
the  violence  of  the  mighty  man  by  the  hand  of  thy  servant 
David,  and  didst  give  the  host  of  aliens  into  the  hands  of 
Jonathan,  the  son  of  Saul,  and  his  armour-bearer."  David,  in  a 
prayer  of  thanksgiving,  is  also  represented  as  recalling  the  good- 
ness of  God  in  the  time  of  the  Exodus :  ''  What  one  nation  in  the 
earth  is  like  thy  people,  even  like  Israel,  whom  God  went  to 
redeem  unto  himself  for  a  people,  and  to  make  him  a  name,  and 
to  do  terrible  things  for  thy  land,  before  thy  people,  whom 
thou  didst  redeem  to  thee  out  of  Egypt,  from  the  nations  and 
their  gods  ? " 

IF  A  very  beautiful  and  striking  illustration  of  this  pheno- 
menon occurs  in  the  prayer  of  thanksgiving  which  is  offered  for 
the  first-fruits.  The  prayer  at  first  seems  curiously  out  of  place 
in  this  connexion  :  it  is  a  tolerably  minute  summary  of  the  facts 
of  Israel's  early  history.  "  A  wandering  Aramean  was  my  father ; 
and  he  went  down  into  Egypt  and  sojourned  there,  few  in 
number,  and  he  became  there  a  nation,  great,  mighty  and  popu- 
lous. And  the  Egyptians  dealt  ill  with  us  and  afflicted  us,  and 
laid  upon  us  hard  bondage  ;  and  we  cried  unto  Jehovah,  the  God 
of  our  fathers,  and  Jehovah  heard  our  voice,  and  saw  our  afflic- 
tion, and  our  toil,  and  our  oppression ;  and  Jehovah  brought  us 
forth  out  of  Egypt  with  a  mighty  hand,  and  with  an  outstretched 


ENCOURAGEMENTS  TO  PRAYER       315 

arm,  and  with  great  terribleness,  and  with  signs,  and  with 
wonders  ;  and  he  hath  brought  us  into  this  place,  and  hath 
given  us  this  land,  a  land  flowing  with  milk  and  honey."  Then 
at  the  end  come  the  simple  words :  "  And  now,  behold,  I  have 
brought  the  first  of  the  fruit  of  the  ground,  which  thou,  O  Jeho- 
vah, hast  given  me." 

In  many  ways,  this  prayer  is  most  characteristic  and  instruc- 
tive. Behind  it  lies  the  thought :  "  We  love  him,  because  he 
first  loved  us".  It  further  suggests  that  gratitude  must  be 
expressed,  not  in  word  only,  but  also  in  deed.  It  links  the  ages 
each  to  each :  God  did  that  then,  therefore  we  do  this  now.  It 
keeps  alive  the  memory  of  the  gracious  past.  But  the  point  with 
which  we  are  immediately  concerned  is  that  the  goodness  of  God 
is  vividly  brought  before  the  mind  of  the  worshipper  by  a  histori- 
cal recital.  The  great  words  "  goodness  "  and  "  loving-kindness  " 
were  not  allowed  to  degenerate  into  empty  phrases ;  they  were 
filled  with  radiant  and  indisputable  historical  fact.  So  much  is 
this  the  case  that  some  of  the  longer  Psalms  practically  form  a  brief 
history  of  early  Israel.  The  past  was  ever  with  them :  it  was 
kept  alive  not  only  in  history,  but  in  prayer.^ 

IF  A  nation  whose  history,  like  our  own,  is  brightened  with  a 
long  series  of  blessings  and  deliverances  received  from  God,  should 
keep  His  great  acts  in  mind,  and  should  gather  encouragement 
from  them  to  hope  in  God,  and  cast  itself  on  Him  when  dangers 
befall  and  darken  all  the  sky.  And  it  is  the  same  with  the 
Church.  Those  who  are  most  familiar  with  the  history  of  the 
Church,  unless  they  have  been  undevout  and  careless  readers 
indeed,  will  be  the  least  ready  to  look  forward  with  gloomy  fore- 
bodings regarding  the  time  to  come.  Remembering  the  years  of 
the  right  hand  of  the  Most  High,  they  will  confide  in  Him  that, 
when  tempests  and  dangers  have  done  their  work  in  humbling 
men  for  their  sins,  and  stirring  them  up  to  seek  God,  they  will 
be  stilled,  and  the  sun  will  shine  forth  again.^ 

III. 
The  Life  of  Christ. 

1.  The  life  of  Christ  is  the  centre  and  core  of  the  Bible,  it  is 
also  the  centre  and  core  of  the  creation ;  it  should  become  the 
centre  and  core  of  each  individual  life.  "Let  thy  servant  be 
exercised   in   thy  life"  is  the  desire  which  runs   through  the 

1  J.  E.  McFadyen,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible,  183. 
'W.  Binnie,  Sermons,  116. 


3i6     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

Imitatio  Ghristi.  That  Imitatio  has  been  an  aid  to  many  in 
realizing  the  end,  but  it  pales  in  importance  before  the  Four 
Gospels  themselves ;  and  if  only  we  can  find  the  right  use  of  the 
Gospels,  we  may  reach  that  goal  which  Thomas  a  Kempis  and  all 
the  followers  of  Christ  have  desired. 

^  The  visitor  to  a  certain  church  in  Rome  will  be  shown  by  the 
attendant  priest  a  marble  slab  with  two  rather  formless  indenta- 
tions impressed  upon  it.  "  These,"  the  priest  will  say,  pointing 
to  the  depressions  in  the  stone,  "  are  the  footprints  of  the  Blessed 
Master."  The  footprints,  of  course,  are  not  genuine;  if  they 
were,  even  a  good  Protestant  might  wish  to  place  his  feet  where 
the  feet  of  the  Lord  had  stood.  Spiritually,  this  was  the  ambition 
of  the  Victorines :  it  is  the  ambition  of  all  the  saints.  For  every 
man  that  hath  this  hope  in  Him  purifieth  himself,  even  as  He 
is  pure.  Mr.  Standfast,  the  Pilgrim,  may  speak  in  the  name  of 
all  who  walk  in  the  process  of  Christ :  "I  have  loved  to  hear  my 
Lord  spoken  of,  and  wherever  I  have  seen  the  print  of  His  shoe 
on  the  earth,  there  have  I  coveted  to  set  my  foot  too  "} 

2.  Now  the  most  striking  of  the  features  of  Christ's  life  is 
that  atmosphere  of  another  world  which  unobtrusively  but  un- 
mistakably pervades  it.  Consider  how  remarkable  this  is ;  how 
a  wider  and  a  higher  realm  is  from  the  first  brought  in  to  explain 
and  to  redeem  this  transitory  life.  As  a  boy,  He  is  conscious 
that  He  must  be  about  the  business  of  His  Heavenly  Father ;  as 
a  man  entering  on  His  task,  He  sees  the  heavens  opened,  and 
hears  the  authenticating  voice  so  vividly  that  He  makes  others 
share  the  vision  and  the  message.  He  comes  at  once  preaching 
the  Kingdom  of  Heaven ;  He  is  certain  that  the  heavenly  atmos- 
phere is  already  upon  earth,  and  equally  certain  that  it  is  to 
become  more  diffused  and  more  recognized.  His  whole  activity 
is  directed  to  bringing  the  heavenly  vision  and  power  to  redress 
the  wrongs,  the  sorrows,  and  the  sins,  of  earth.  His  lips  are 
seldom  opened  but  there  comes  out  some  parable  of  the  Kingdom 
of  Heaven,  or  some  word  which  breathes  heavenly  power  and 
insight  into  the  shadowed  hearts  of  men.  And  if  we  have  at- 
tentively followed  the  records  of  the  brief  life,  and  of  the  porten- 
tous death  to  which  the  stupidity  and  sin  of  men  subjected  this 
messenger  from  another  sphere,  we  are  not  surprised  to  read  that 

*  D.  M.  Mclntyre,  Wayviarks  in  the  Pursuit  of  Ood,  206. 


ENCOURAGEMENTS  TO  PRAYER       317 

death  was  not  able  to  hold  Him,  but  that,  breaking  the  bars  of 
the  tomb,  He  returned  naturally  to  the  heaven  whence  He  came. 

IF  Jeremy  Taylor,  in  his  Life  of  Christ,  gives  a  noble  example 
of  the  use  which  may  be  made  of  the  Gospels.  Taking  each 
section  of  the  story  in  detail,  he  makes  the  most  searching  applica- 
tion of  it  to  the  practice  of  the  Christian  life,  adding  a  prayer  to 
be  used  for  the  assimilation  of  the  truth  which  in  each  section 
has  been  elicited.  One  who  should  faithfully  follow  this  great 
work  day  by  day,  learning  the  lesson  and  offering  the  prayer, 
would  assuredly  be  exercised  in  the  life  of  Christ,  and  would 
make  much  progress  in  the  imitation  of  the  great  example.  But 
there  is  little  hope  that  the  busy  mind  of  the  twentieth  century 
will  be  disposed  to  follow  the  elaborate  and  discursive  method  of 
the  seventeenth  century.  The  sustained  eloquence,  the  vast 
learning,  and  the  spiritual  fervour  which  pervade  the  pages  of 
Jeremy  Taylor  will  delight  every  reader,  but  will  not  induce 
many  to  read.^ 

3.  Jesus  set  a  great  example  in  prayer.  He  had  a  real  and 
intense  prayer-life,  great  in  its  dependence  and  great  in  its 
earnestness.  He  prayed  when  He  had  special  need  of  God,  before 
the  great  events  of  His  life,  and  before  His  great  works.  But 
He  also  prayed  in  intercession  for  His  disciples  and  for  future 
believers,  for  Peter  and  for  the  soldiers  at  the  cross.  He  prayed 
before  some  great  experience  came  to  Him  from  without.  Therein 
He  was  in  line  with  the  instinct  of  all  of  us.  If  a  man  stands  at 
one  of  life's  great  beginnings,  there  are  words  of  prayer  upon  his 
lips.  And  He  prayed  before  the  output  of  energy.  Great  men 
of  action,  as  well  as  men  of  thought,  have  found  the  need  of 
prayer.  But  also,  and  particularly,  in  His  intercedings,  Jesus 
acted  on  that  type  of  prayer  which  involves  all  the  difficulties  for 
modern  minds. 

(1)  It  is  a  source  of  intellectual  rest  to  see  Jesus  in  prayer 
and  to  listen  to  the  tender  pleading  tones  of  His  supplications. 
Sometimes  we  are  tempted  to  ask, — who  indeed  is  not  ? — Is  it 
worth  while  to  pray  ?  Can  it  do  any  good  ?  Is  not  this  an 
ordered  universe,  based  on  law,  administered  in  obedience  to  law 
by  One  who  is  Himself  the  Lawmaker  and  Lawgiver,  and  the 
very  Fountain  of  all  order,  and  who  is  not  likely  to  have  left  room 

1 B.  F.  Horton,  The  Optn  Secret,  138. 


3i8     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

to  deviate  from  His  regulations  in  compliance  with  the  expres- 
sion of  our  confused  and  bewildered  desires  ?  Is  He  not  bound 
in  chains  so  inexorable  that  all  asking  and  receiving  are  absolutely 
and  for  ever  shut  out  ?  So  it  often  seems,  and  yet  He  prays ;  and 
therefore  I  may.  He,  the  Son  of  the  Father,  who  comes  from  the 
bosom  of  the  Father,  from  the  deepest  intimacies  of  the  Divine, 
who  knew  the  Father  as  no  one  else  ever  can — He  prays,  not  once 
or  twice,  as  if  by  accident,  but  often  and  long,  and  specially  and 
with  much  feeling,  in  the  crises  of  His  work  and  mission. 

Cold  mountains  and  the  midnight  air 
Witnessed  the  fervour  of  His  prayer. 

H  I  cannot  answer  all  the  curious  questions  of  the  brain  con- 
cerning prayer  and  law ;  not  half  of  them,  indeed ;  and  I  will 
not  attempt  it ;  but  like  Knox,  I  will  cast  my  anchor  here,  in  this 
revealing  fact  that  He,  the  Holiest  of  the  holy,  and  the  Wisest  of 
the  wise,  He  prays;  therefore  I  am  assured  this  anchorage  of 
Divine  example  will  hold  the  vessel  in  the  tossings  of  the  wildest 
sea  of  doubt,  and  that  I  shall  be  safe  as  He  was  if  the  vessel  itself 
is  engulfed  in  the  waves  of  suffering  and  sorrow.  His  act  is  an 
argument.  His  prayer  is  an  inspiration.  His  achievements  are 
the  everlasting  and  all-sufficient  vindication  of  prayer.^ 

(2)  But  secondly,  it  is  a  revelation  of  the  truest  sources  of 
moral  power  to  see  Jesus  the  Son  of  Gody  in  communion  with  His 
Father  in  this  the  chiefest  crisis  of  His  life.  Indeed,  it  is  this 
urgent  need  of  immediate  help  He  puts  in  the  very  foreground  as 
His  plea  for  praying  at  all.  Each  opening  word  indicated  the 
hunger  of  His  soul  for  strength.  He  says,  "  Father,  the  hour  is 
eome  ".  He  is  a  child,  and  a  child  in  sore  trouble ;  and  to  whom 
should  He  go  if  not  to  His  Father  ?  And  what  should  He  do  in 
this  dark  day  if  not  talk  to  Him  and  tell  all  He  feels  and  hopes 
and  endures  ?  The  relation  vindicates  the  fullest,  freest  speech, 
invites  the  most  outspoken  confidence.  He  is  the  Son  of  the 
Father ;  come  from  His  bosom,  and  come  to  do  His  will ;  has 
found  His  meat,  His  very  life  and  its  nourishment,  in  this  close 
and  most  endearing  relation;  and  therefore,  with  a  naturalness 
that  is  itself  an  argument.  He  begins  in  this  dark  night  with  the 
word,  so  sweet,  so  strong,  so  revealing,  "  Father,  the  great  dread 

^  John  Clifford,  Social  Worship,  64. 


ENCOURAGEMENTS  TO  PRAYER       319 

hour  has  come ;  hold  Thou  Me  up  ;  keep  Me  true,  help  and  glorify 
Thy  Son". 

IF  There  are  on  record  three  prayers  of  our  Divine  Lord,  each 
of  which  presents  Him  to  us  in  a  different  aspect.  In  one  of 
them  He  appears  in  His  human  soul,  shrinking  with  all  the 
sensitiveness  of  innocence  from  the  cruel  necessity  imposed  on 
Him  by  the  work  of  human  redemption  which  He  had  undertaken ; 
"  O  my  Father,  if  it  be  possible,  let  this  cup  pass  from  me : 
nevertheless  not  as  I  will,  but  as  thou  wilt ".  In  another  He 
appears  as  a  Prophet  or  Teacher,  instructing  His  disciples  after 
what  manner  they  are  to  approach  God,  He  Himself  not  being 
involved  in  the  prayer  which  He  dictates ;  for  how  could  He  who 
was  "  holy,  harmless,  undefiled  " — who  has  no  trespasses — pray, 
"  Forgive  us  our  trespasses  "  ?  This  is  the  Lord's  Prayer.  In  the 
third  prayer,  He  appears  as  a  Priest  interceding  for  His  people ; 
He  embraces  both  Himself  and  them  in  His  petition,  asking  for 
His  own  glorification  and  for  theirs  with  Him.  This  is  the 
prayer  in  the  seventeenth  chapter  of  St.  John,  usually  called  the 
Great  High-priestly  Prayer.  Thus  we  have  from  the  Lord's  lips 
one  prayer  for  Himself  exclusively,  one  prayer  for  His  Church 
exclusively,  and  one  prayer  for  Himself  and  His  Church  together.^ 

4.  He  who  paces  along  this  wondrous  way  of  the  life  of  the 
Son  of  Man,  making  it  his  example  and  his  pillar  of  cloud  by 
day,  his  meditation  and  his  pillar  of  fire  by  night,  is  brought  to 
a  still  surer  conviction,  for  He  whom  he  follows  approaches  to  a 
more  intimate  intercourse — Christ  is  formed  within,  and  is  the 
clearer  evidence  of  the  Christ  whose  life  was  once  lived  without. 
But  our  devotion  can  hardly  proceed  unless  it  throbs  with  the 
desire  to  make  known  our  Lord,  who  is  its  object,  to  every  human 
soul.  With  what  countenance  can  we  worship  Him,  and  with 
what  words  can  we  show  our  obedience,  if  we  do  not  share  His 
longing  for  the  extension  of  the  Kingdom  ?  And  in  this  portion 
He  reminds  us  that  we  may  promote  His  object  not  only  by  going 
as  His  messengers,  but  also  by  praying  that  more  labourers  may 
be  sent  into  the  harvest.  Here  is  a  direction  for  our  constant 
and  believing  prayers,  and  we  are  to  grasp  the  thought  that  to 
pray  in  the  name  of  Jesus  is  to  pray  for  the  things  which  He 
desires  or  commands. 

1 E.  M.  Goulburn,  The  Lord's  Prayer,  2. 


320     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  I  ask  you  to  realize  to  yourselves  that  our  own  mission- 
aries are  very  apostles  who  are  ever  pleading  with  you  for  help 
in  the  discharge  of  their  Divine  office,  while  they  set  before  you 
the  ends  which  seem  to  lie  within  their  range.  I  ask  you  to  see 
a  fresh  Corinth,  no  less  beset  by  idolatry  and  unbelief  and  cor- 
ruption than  that  Corinth  from  which  St.  Paul  wrote  to  his 
Macedonian  converts,  in  Calcutta,  or  Benares,  or  Cawnpore,  or 
Delhi,  or  Lahore.  I  ask  you  to  compare  your  own  spiritual 
privileges  with  those  of  the  Christians  of  Thessalonica,  your 
freedom,  your  resources,  your  knowledge,  your  obligations,  with 
theirs.  And  then  when  you  have  done  this,  when  you  have  felt 
who  are  the  pleaders  now  and  what  is  the  cause,  I  ask  you  if 
you  can  put  aside  the  petition  which  comes  to  you  in  the  apostolic 
words,  "  Brethren,  pray  for  us,  that  the  word  of  God  may  run  and 
be  glorified  " ;  if  you  can  decline  the  fellowship  which  is  offered 
you  in  making  known  the  Gospel  by  which  you  live,  or  if  you 
are  not  rather  grieved  that  more  is  not  demanded  of  you  to  whom 
much  has  been  given. ^ 

IF  It  is  said  that  the  way-worn  labourers  of  lona  found  their 
burdens  grow  lighter  when  they  reached  the  most  difficult  part  of 
their  journey  because  the  secret  prayers  of  their  aged  master 
Columba  met  them  there.  I  can  well  believe  the  story ;  and 
such  comfort  of  unspoken  sympathy  the  Church  at  home  can 
give  to  the  isolated  missionary.  If  when  he  is  saddened  by  the 
spectacle  of  evil  which  has  been  accumulated  and  grown  hard 
through  countless  generations ;  if  when  his  words  find  no  entrance 
because  the  very  power  of  understanding  them  is  wanting ;  if 
when  he  watches  his  life  ebb  and  his  work  remain  undone  and 
almost  unattempted,  he  can  turn  homeward  with  the  certain 
knowledge  that  in  England  unnumbered  fellow-labourers  are 
striving  from  day  to  day  to  lighten  his  sorrows  and  to  cheer  his 
loneliness,  I  can  well  believe  that  he  too  will  find  that  refresh- 
ment and  joy  in  the  consciousness  of  deep  human  fellowship,  in 
our  Lord  and  Saviour,  which  will  nerve  him  for  new  and  greater 
toil ;  that  he  will  be  strong  again  with  the  strength  of  holy  com- 
panionship and  courageous  with  the  solace  of  hope.  "  You  inter- 
cede for  us,  I  know,"  are  words  which  I  read  this  afternoon  in  a 
letter  from  one  of  our  friends  in  a  post  of  singular  difficulty. 
God  deals  with  us  as  men  and  helps  us  through  men.^ 

1  Brooke  Foss  Westcott,  Lessons  from  Work,  204.  ^Ilid,,  208. 


ENCOURAGEMENTS  TO  PRAYER      321 

IV. 

The  Promises. 

1.  Personal  conviction  of  the  power  and  influence  of  prayer 
can  be  gained  only  by  a  man  who  himself  lives  in  prayer.  It  is 
attainable  in  the  same  way  as  one  becomes  convinced  of  the  love 
of  another,  namely,  by  living  along  with  him.  And  a  proof  that 
we  are  not  the  victims  of  any  form  of  self-deception  is  afforded 
us  in  the  harmonious  testimony  of  all  those  who  have  been 
thoroughly  versed  and  experienced  in  the  world  of  prayer.  Every 
actual  experience  of  prayer  is  a  Yea  and  Amen  to  the  promises 
of  the  Lord,  to  His  positive  declaration  that  God  hears  prayer. 
He  said :  "  Ask,  and  it  shall  be  given  you ;  seek,  and  ye  shall 
find ;  knock,  and  it  shall  be  opened  unto  you  :  for  every  one  that 
asketh  receiveth ;  and  he  that  seeketh  findeth ;  and  to  him  that 
knocketh  it  shall  be  opened  ".  When  describing  the  woe  falling 
on  the  whole  Jewish  nation  at  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  He 
said  to  His  disciples :  "  And  pray  ye  that  your  flight  be  not  in 
the  winter.  For  in  those  days  shall  be  affliction,  such  as  was  not 
from  the  beginning  of  the  creation  which  God  created  unto  this 
time,  neither  shall  be."  Here,  therefore,  the  Saviour  charges 
His  disciples  to  pray  for  a  mitigation  of  impending  calamities. 
Would  He  have  so  charged  them  if  there  were  no  answering  of 
prayer  ?  When  He  saw  the  people,  and  had  compassion  on  them 
because  they  were  faint  and  scattered,  like  sheep  without  a 
shepherd,  He  said  to  the  disciples,  **  The  harvest  truly  is  plenteous, 
but  the  labourers  are  few.  Pray  ye  therefore  the  Lord  of  the 
harvest,  that  he  send  forth  labourers  into  his  harvest."  Would 
He  have  made  such  a  prayer  binding  on  us  if  He  had  deemed  it 
unmeaning  ?  Finally,  He  assured  His  people  that  where  two  or 
three  of  them  agree  to  ask  anything  it  shall  be  done  for  them  by 
their  Heavenly  Father,  and  then  added,  "  For  where  two  or  three 
are  gathered  together  in  my  name,  there  am  I  in  the  midst  of 
them."  Whoever  believes  in  the  Saviour  at  all  has,  along  with 
faith  in  the  truth  of  His  sayings,  the  pledge  that  God  answers 
prayer. 

H  To  mitigate  or  ease  the  sorowis  of  our  woundit  conscience, 
two  plaisteris  hath  oure  maist  prudent  Phisitioun  provydit  to 
gif  us  incouragement  to  pray  (notwithstanding  the  knawledge  of 

?l 


322    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

offences  committit),  that  is,  a  precept  and  a  promeis.  The  pre- 
cept or  commandement  to  pray  is  universall,  frequentlie  inculcat 
and  repeatit  in  God  is  Scriptures  :  "  Aske,  and  it  salbe  gevin  unto 
yow  ".  "  Call  upon  me  in  the  day  of  trubill."  "  Watche  and 
pray  that  ye  fall  not  into  temptatioun."  "I  command  that  ye 
pray  ever  without  ceassing."  "  Mak  deprecationis  incessabill,  and 
gif  thankis  in  all  thingis."  Whilk  commandement  is,  who  so 
contempneth  or  dispyseth,  doith  equallie  sin  with  him  that  doith 
steill ;  for  in  this  commandement  thow  sail  not  steill  is  a  precept 
negative ;  sa  thou  sail  pray  is  a  commandement  affirmative.  And 
God  requyreth  equall  obedience  of  and  to  all  his  commandementis. 
To  this  commandement  he  addeth  his  maist  undoutit  promeis 
in  many  places,  "  Aske,  and  ye  sail  receave ;  seik,  and  ye  sail 
find  ".  And  by  the  Prophet  Jeremie,  God  sayeth,  "  Ye  sail  call 
upon  me,  and  I  sail  heir  yow  ".  "  Ye  sail  seik  and  sail  find  me." 
And  by  Esay,  he  sayeth,  "May  the  Father  forget  his  naturall 
son,  or  the  Mother  the  chyld  of  hir  wombe  ?  and  althocht  thai 
do,  yit  sail  I  not  forget  suche  as  call  upon  me."  And  heirto 
correspond  and  agrie  the  wordis  of  Jesus  Chryst,  saying,  "  Yf  ye 
being  wickit  can  gif  gud  giftis  to  your  children,  muche  more  my 
heavinlie  Father  sail  gif  the  Halie  Gaist  to  thame  that  aske  him." 
And  that  we  suld  not  think  God  to  be  absent,  or  not  to  heir  us, 
accuseth  Moses,  saying,  "Thair  is  no  natioun  that  have  thair 
Godis  so  adherent,  or  neir  unto  thame  as  oure  God,  whilk  is 
present  at  all  oure  prayeris".  Also  the  Psalmist  "Neir  is  the 
Lord  unto  all  that  call  upon  him  in  veritie  ".  And  Chryst  sayeth, 
"  Whairsoever  tuo  or  thrie  ar  gatherit  together  in  my  name,  thair 
am  I  in  the  middis  of  thame."  ^ 

IF  No  one  who  knows  the  largeness  and  liberality  of  the 
Divine  promises  will  complain  of  their  being  scanty.  The  roll 
of  the  promises  let  down  from  heaven  is  more  full  of  varied  food 
for  the  spirit  of  man  than  that  great  sheet  which  the  Apostle 
saw  in  vision  was  full  of  varied  food  for  his  body.  They  are  a 
goodly  body  of  most  gracious  store  for  equipping  the  immortal 
spirit  for  its  wilderness-journey,  and,  moreover,  like  the  ark  of 
Noah,  containing  the  seeds  and  rudiments  and  enjoyments  in 
that  new  world  where  she  is  soon  to  rest  for  ever ;  or,  according 
to  St.  Peter,  they  are  like  so  many  beacons  lighted  up  in  the 
dark,  wild,  and  untrodden  future,  whereunto  we  do  well  that  we 
take  heed,  as  unto  a  light  that  shineth  in  a  dark  place,  until  the 
day  dawn  and  the  day-star  arise  in  our  hearts.  And,  to  carry 
the  figure  a  little  further,  in  each  of  these  enlightened  beacons 
resides  an  oracle  from  the  Most  High  to  guide  the  goings  forth 

1  The  Works  of  John  Knox,  iii.  91. 


ENCOURAGEMENTS  TO  PRAYER        323 

of  the  believer's  hopes  and  purposes.  In  sight  of  these  he  is  not 
far  from  tidings  of  the  land  to  which  he  sojourns ;  out  of  sight 
of  them,  he  is  guideless,  aimless,  and  helpless,  in  the  midst  of  a 
wide  and  waste  ocean  of  uncertainty.^ 

2.  The  manner  of  God's  dealing  is  largely  by  promise,  and  on 
the  ground  of  that  promise  must  we  deal  with  Him.  From  the 
beginning  it  has  been  so.  God's  covenant  has  been  evermore  a 
covenant  of  promise.  Not  a  contract  or  compact ;  not,  Bring 
this,  and  I  will  accept ;  not,  Do  this,  and  I  will  bless  ;  but  rather, 
I  promise,  therefore  live — I  promise,  therefore  love  !  The  cove- 
nant itself  was  promise.  And  that  prayer  which  is  based  on 
knowledge  must  ever  on  that  account  be  based  on  promise. 

The  promise  is  no  single  separate  utterance ;  no  number,  no 
multitude,  of  bare  literal  engagements,  which  must  be  found 
somewhere  in  the  bond,  and  then  rehearsed,  by  page  and  clause, 
as  the  justification  of  the  particular  demand.  The  promise  of 
God,  like  the  revelation  of  God,  like  the  counsel  of  God,  like  the 
character  of  God,  is  at  once  ample  to  magnificence  and  simple 
even  to  unity.  One  broad,  deep,  majestic  stream,  like  the  river 
which  went  forth  from  Eden,  compasses  all  God's  earth,  and 
waters  on  every  side  the  garden  of  His  creation.  It  is  the 
declaration  of  His  will  that  all  should  be  saved.  It  is  the  cry 
from  the  temple-court  on  the  last  and  great  day  of  the  feast,  "  If 
any  man  thirst,  let  him  come  unto  me  and  drink  ".  "  There  is  a 
river,  the  streams  whereof  make  glad  the  city  of  God,  the  holy 
place  of  the  tabernacles  of  the  Most  High.  God  is  in  the  midst 
of  her,  she  shall  not  be  moved  :  God  shall  help  her,  and  that 
right  early."     "  This  is  the  will  of  God,  even  your  sanctification." 

IF  In  going  to  God,  we  greatly  honour  Him,  when  we  remind 
Him  of  His  promises,  and  declare  our  entire  dependence  on  them. 
See  the  example  of  Jacob,  who  for  his  power  in  prayer  was  sur- 
named  Israel.  He  had  been  assured,  in  a  dream,  that  God  would 
be  with  him  in  all  places,  and  never  leave  him  till  He  had  fulfilled 
to  him  His  promises  in  their  fullest  extent.  Full  twenty  years 
afterwards,  Jacob,  in  a  season  of  great  distress,  reminded  God  of 
this  promise,  saying,  "  0  God  of  my  father  Abraham,  and  God  of 
my  father  Isaac,  the  Lord  which  saidst  unto  me.  Return  unto 
thy  country,  and  to  thy  kindred,  and  I  will  deal  well  with  thee : 


^  The  Collected  Writings  of  Edward  Irving,  iii.  9. 


I 


324    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

deliver  me,  I  pray  thee,  for  thou  saidst,  I  will  surely  do  thee 
good  ".  Thus  we  should  bear  in  mind  the  promises  which  God 
has  given  us,  and  present  before  Him  those  which  are  in  a  more 
peculiar  manner  suited  to  our  state.  This  will  give  us  confidence 
before  God ;  and  it  will  secure  to  us  infallibly  an  answer  of 
peace  :  for  "  this  is  the  confidence  that  we  have  in  him,  that,  if  we 
ask  any  thing  according  to  his  will,  he  heareth  us  :  and  if  we 
know  that  he  hear  us,  whatsoever  we  ask,  we  know  that  we  have 
the  petitions  that  we  desired  of  him".^ 

^  If  God  had  promised  nothing,  we  could  have  expected  noth- 
ing :  and  if  His  promises  were  not  steadfast,  we  might  have  been 
deceived  in  our  expectation.  Therefore  it  is  that  the  first  reve- 
lation was  a  promise,  and  the  revelations  to  Noah  and  to  Abraham 
were  promises,  and  the  law  was  a  prefiguration  of  good  things  to 
come,  and  the  prophecies  are  dark  declarations  of  the  events  of 
promises,  and  the  gifts  of  God's  Spirit,  with  all  the  attainments 
of  the  Christian  life,  are  promises,  and  the  Apocalypse  is  a  promise 
extending  to  the  end  of  time ;  and  when  it  comes  to  pass  that 
there  are  no  promises  unaccomplished,  then  will  prayer  cease ; 
but  that  will  never  be,  till  prayer  and  all  other  instruments  of 
grace  be  rendered  useless  by  the  revelation  of  glory,  when  instead 
of  faith  shall  come  honour,  and  in  place  of  hope  the  things  hoped 
for.2 

IF  John  Bunyan  spoke  of  ''leaping  into  the  bosom  of  the 
promise".  They  find  a  tranquil  refuge  who  so  do.  Take  ex- 
ample of  Bunyan,  my  friend  !  When  prayer  seems  impossible 
set  the  promise  of  God  before  your  eyes  and  leap  into  its  shelter- 
ing bosom.  Peter  speaks  of  God's  "  precious  and  exceeding  great 
promises,"  and  that  is  characterization  incomparable  because  in- 
spired of  God.  God's  promises  are  all "  precious  "  and  all  "  exceed- 
ing great  ".  Nor  is  this  least  true  of  the  promises  which  relate  to 
prayer.  What  strong  encouragement  the  promises  give  to  the 
prayer  of  faith  !  The  practical  difiiculty  of  prayer  would  melt 
away  did  we  but  avail  ourselves  of  the  resource  of  promise  which 
God  has  given  us  in  the  Scriptures.  I  am  ever  and  anon  saying 
despondently,  "  How  can  the  servant  of  this  my  lord  talk  with 
this  my  lord  ? "  because  I  fail  to  remember  His  promises.^ 

3.  Last  of  all,  our  prayer  should  be  in  line  with  God's  promises. 
Not  every  desire  is  a  fit  subject  for  prayer.     No  one  would  pray 

» C.  Simeon,  Works,  iii.  264. 

'  I'he  Collected  Writings  of  Edward  Irving,  iii.  7. 

» Dinsdale  T.  Young,  The  Enthusiasm  of  God,  198, 


ENCOURAGEMENTS  TO  PRAYER      325 

a  sinful  wish ;  there  are  desires  which,  like  birds  of  evil  omen, 
shun,  of  themselves,  the  light  of  God.  A  prayer  might  be  sincere, 
in  so  far  as  it  breathed  a  wish,  and  yet  conscience  itself  might 
condemn  it  as  unfit  for  God's  hearing.  When  we  pursue  and 
ponder  this  distinction — and  it  is  an  important  one — we  shall 
find  no  rest  for  our  reflections  till  we  reach  this  point,  that 
promise  is  the  chart  and  rudder  and  compass  of  supplication; 
that  only  such  things  as  God  has  promised  are  safe  and  fitting 
topics  for  His  people's  prayers. 

We  are  not  counselling  that  poor  and  servile  use  of  the  word 
of  promise  which  would  turn  the  texts  of  the  Bible  into  a  string 
of  engagements  and  compacts,  which  are  to  be  urged,  as  it  were, 
and  pleaded,  singly  and  severally,  as  making  God  man's  debtor, 
and  false  if  He  pays  not.  The  Bible  is  not  thus  indexed  and 
labelled  for  quotation,  nor  is  the  free  Spirit  thus  to  be  tied  and 
fettered  by  the  lifeless  letter.  Away  with  such  uses  of  the  Bible 
as  would  make  it  over  again  a  mere  Decalogue  of  conditions  and 
precepts,  instead  of  a  fresh  rustling  breeze,  sweeping  with  health 
and  fragrance  over  the  dry  arid  wastes  of  man's  servitude  and 
man's  corruption.  Prayer  opens  an  outlet  for  the  promises, 
removes  the  hindrances  in  the  way  of  their  execution,  puts  them 
into  working  order,  and  secures  their  gracious  ends. 

IT  When  you  examine  the  utterances  of  Christ  with  regard  to 
prayer,  you  find  that  they  consist  of  large  general  promises, 
subsequently  defined  and  made  more  exact.  "  Ask,  and  ye  shall 
receive."  Here  is  a  large  general  promise.  It  arrests  the 
attention  by  its  obvious  contradiction  to  facts  of  experience.  It 
stimulates  further  inquiry,  and  further  inquiry  is  met  by  exacter 
statements.  "  Therefore  I  say  unto  you,  all  things  whatsoever 
ye  pray  and  ask  for,  believe  that  ye  have  received  them,  and  ye 
shall  have  them."  Again,  "If  ye  abide  in  me,  and  my  words 
abide  in  you,  ask  whatsoever  ye  will,  and  it  shall  be  done  unto 
you  ".  Once  more,  "  Verily,  verily,  I  say  unto  you,  if  ye  shall 
ask  anything  of  the  Father,  he  will  give  it  you  in  my  name. 
Hitherto  have  ye  asked  nothing  in  my  name  :  ask,  and  ye  shall 
receive,  that  your  joy  may  be  fulfilled."  When  we  come  to 
consider  them,  these  further  definitions  of  the  conditions  of 
prayer  are  found  to  be  in  close  agreement.  Thus  it  is  morally 
impossible  to  have  a  real  confidence  that  the  things  we  are  asking 
for  shall  be  certainly  received,  imless  our  petitions  are  grounded 


326    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

on  some  real  knowledge  of  the  mind  and  method  of  God ;  other- 
wise asking  would  be  a  mere  crying  for  the  moon.^ 

IF  Christ's  signature  is  at  every  promise,  His  name  perfumes 
each  one.     They  are  all  "yea "  in  Him.^ 

^  C.  Gore,  Prayer  and  the  Lord's  Prayer,  15. 
2  A.  A.  Bonar,  Wayside  Wells,  111. 


XVI. 
The  Perplexities  of  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H.,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 

Balch,  A.  K,  Prayer  (1909). 

Biederwolf,  W.  E.,  How  Can  God  Answer  Prayer  ?  (1913). 

Blewett,  G.  J.,  The  Christian  View  of  the  World  (1912). 

Bowne,  B.  P.,  The  Essence  of  Religion  (1911). 

Carpenter,  W.  B.,  Thoughts  on  Prayer  (1907). 

(Jon well,  R.  H.,  How  to  Live  the  Christ  Life  (1912). 

Cornaby,  W.  A.,  In  Touch  with  Reality. 

Douglas,  A,  F.,  Prayer :  A  Practical  Treatise  (1901). 

Greenwell,  Dora,  Essays  (1867). 

Hardy,  E.  J.,  Doubt  and  Faith  (1899). 

Horton,  R.  F.,  The  Prayer- House  of  God. 

Ingram,  A.  F.  W.,  The  Call  of  the  Father  (1907). 

Lang,  C.  G.,  The  Miracles  of  Jesus  (1901). 

McCormick,  C.  W.,  The  Heart  of  Prayer  (1913). 

MacDonald,  G.,  Unspoken  Sermons,  ii.  (1891). 

Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

Macleod,  A.,  The  Child  Jesus  (1895). 

Matheson,  G.,  Moments  on  the  Mount  (1885). 

Robinson,  A.  W. ,  The  Voice  of  Joy  and  Health  (1911). 

Warrack,  Grace,  in  Introduction  to   Julian   of  Norwich's   Revelations  of 

Divine  Love  (1901). 
Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 
Christus  Futurus  (1907). 


The  Perplexities  of  Prayer. 

There  are  few  things  in  the  religious  life  so  disquieting  as  the 
perplexities  of  prayer.  We  make  our  prayer,  earnestly,  deliber- 
ately ;  we  are  sure  that  what  we  ask  is  not  plainly  against  God's 
will.  Sometimes  there  seems  to  be  no  answer  at  all.  We  pray 
and  pray,  and  the  heavens  seem  to  be  as  brass.  Sometimes 
the  answer,  if  it  comes,  is  long  deferred.  Sometimes,  if  circum- 
stances that  occur  be  the  answer,  they  are  strangely  different 
from  what  we  asked  or  expected. 

1.  Now,  in  entering  even  a  very  little  way  into  the  perplexed 
question  of  denials  and  delays  in  prayer,  it  seems  well  to  touch 
upon  a  point  too  little  taken  into  account  in  the  general  Christian 
mind,  that  question  of  the  times  and  seasons  which  the  Father 
hath  left  in  His  own  hand,  and  which  we  cannot  take  into  ours. 
"  All  things,"  it  has  been  said,  "  are  not  possible  to  all  men  at 
all  times; "  and  for  want  of  duly  acknowledging  this  statute  of 
limitation,  many  devotional  books,  and  a  great  deal  of  religious 
teaching,  tend  only  to  bring  strain  and  anguish  upon  the  sincere 
mind,  which  feels  that  it  cannot  rise  to  the  prescribed  level  until 
it  is  lifted  there  by  God  Himself.  There  come,  alike  to  indivi- 
duals and  to  churches,  days  of  refreshing  from  the  Lord,  times  of 
visitation  which  the  strongest  urgency  of  the  human  spirit  cannot 
antedate,  but  which  it  is  its  highest  wisdom  to  meet,  so  as  to  be 
found  willing  in  the  day  of  God's  power.  If  the  whole  year  were 
one  long  harvest,  where  were  then  the  sowing,  the  patient  ex- 
pectation, the  ploughing  in  the  cold  ?  A  vintage  comes  once  in  a 
year,  a  triumph  perhaps  once  in  a  lifetime.  So  has  the  Christian 
life  its  seasons,  its  epochs,  its  days  of  benediction.  There  are 
times,  probably,  in  the  life  of  every  faithful  believer,  when  things 
long  desired  and  sought  after  are  dropped  like  golden  gifts  within 
his  bosom.     There  are  few  tried  Christians  who  have  not  known 

329 


330    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

times  when  God,  suddenly  or  gradually,  has  lifted  a  weight  from 
off  their  lives,  has  brought  a  power  within  their  souls,  has  so 
mitigated  some  afflictive  dispensation  as  to  make  that  endurable 
which  was  previously  intolerable,  has  rendered  some  long  desired 
and  apparently  unattainable  temporal  or  spiritual  aim  possible, 
practicable,  easy.  How  many  blessings  at  such  a  season  will 
God,  by  one  sweep  of  His  mighty  arm,  bring  within  the  soul's 
grasp  !  He  will  at  once  enlarge  the  soul's  border,  and  visibly  de- 
fend the  land  He  has  made  so  broad  and  fruitful,  giving  it  rest 
from  all  its  enemies  round  about.  Often  in  times  of  great  tribu- 
lation the  prophecy  of  such  a  season  will  be  borne  like  a  breath 
from  heaven  across  the  wasted  and  desolate  spirit : — 

A  little  hint  to  solace  woe, 

A  hint,  a  murmur  breathing  low, 

I  may  not  speak  of  what  I  know. 

2.  We  shall  consider  three  situations  separately — (1)  no 
answer,  (2)  a  deferred  answer,  (3)  a  different  answer.  But 
first  of  all  let  us  remember  that  we  are  not  by  any  means 
the  best  judges  of  what  constitutes  an  answer  to  prayer.  No 
doubt  it  must  frequently  happen  that  what  seems  a  refusal  is 
really  the  kindest  and  best  of  answers.  Let  us  never  forget  that 
the  most  earnest  and  intense  prayer  ever  offered  in  the  history 
of  the  world  was  a  prayer  that  seemed  to  meet  with  a  refusal. 
Yet  in  that  very  prayer,  offered  in  an  agony  of  desire,  a  New 
Testament  writer  assures  us  that  our  Lord  was  heard  for  His 
filial  piety  and  submission  to  His  Father's  will.  Of  course, 
the  Father  heard  those  outpoured  supplications,  felt  in  His 
Divine  sensibilities  the  full  force  of  those  strong  cries  and  tears ; 
and  surely,  in  this  case,  as  St.  John  teaches  us  in  all  similar  cases, 
with  Him  to  hear  was  to  answer.  Did  He  not  answer  ?  Surely 
the  joy  that  must  fill  the  heart  of  the  Son  of  Man  through  ages 
of  gratified  benevolence  (and  this  is  the  highest  of  all  joys),  in 
which  He  has  been,  and  still  is,  entitled  to  carry  on  His  media- 
torial work,  and  prove  Himself  the  Saviour  of  the  lost,  is  a 
witness  to  the  fact  that,  in  denying  Him  what  He  asked,  the 
Father  answered  the  prayer  of  His  Son  much  more  fully  than  it 
would  have  been  answered  had  that  cup  passed  from  His 
trembling  hand.      He  asked  that  He   might   evade  the  dread 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER      331 

ordeal  that  lay  before  Him,  that  He  might  escape  the  pain,  the 
sorrow,  the  loneliness,  the  heart-breaking  desolation ;  but  He  also 
asked  that  God's  will  might  be  done.  The  answer  came  not  in 
His  being  allowed  to  escape  the  sorrow,  but  in  His  finding  through 
the  sorrow  a  new  and  wonderful  joy,  compared  with  which  even 
His  passion  was  a  "  light  affliction  and  but  for  a  moment,"  how- 
ever far  from  being  light  it  was  in  itself.  How  much  the  human 
Christ  gained  in  His  own  experience  from  the  fact  that  the 
answer  came  as  His  Father  willed,  and  not  as  His  own  human 
will  would  have  preferred  that  it  should  come  ! 

In  the  prayers  of  very  many  of  those  who  love  God,  slowly 
a  change  is  wrought.  We  begin  our  life  with  eager  and  im- 
patient hearts;  and  in  the  impatience  and  the  eagerness  our 
religion  on  all  its  sides  is  likely  to  share.  Our  plans  and  hopes 
stand  clearly  before  our  minds;  when  danger  threatens  them, 
our  sense  of  the  danger  is  acute  and  vivid.  The  imminence  of 
the  peril,  the  cruelty  of  the  possible  loss,  the  loveliness  of  that 
which  seems  about  to  be  destroyed,  the  hopelessness  of  a  future 
from  which  those  fair  forms  are  gone,  or  in  which  those  carefully 
formed  plans  are  to  find  no  realization  and  have  no  place — with 
pitiless  clearness  all  this  is  present  to  our  minds,  and  we  hasten 
to  God  with  petitions  most  definite  and  most  urgent.  Just  what 
God  should  do  for  us,  just  what  He  should  do  for  His  Kingdom 
in  this  difficult  and  critical  time,  we  tell  Him.  And  then  we 
wait  for  the  answer,  sometimes  divided  between  hope  and  fear, 
sometimes  in  that  faith  which  is  ready  to  think  of  God  as  under 
compulsion  to  reduce  the  whole  system  of  nature  to  anarchy 
when  our  hearts  are  set  upon  something  that  we  can  have  only 
through  the  shattering  of  the  natural  order,  and  we  ask  God  for 
it  with  an  undoubting  belief  that  He  is  going  to  give  it  to  us — a 
view  of  prayer  pathetic  were  it  not  so  splendid,  pitiable  were  it 
not  that  it  is  often  held  in  that  simplicity  of  heart  which  is  the 
root  and  beginning  of  every  human  excellence.  But  the  God  to 
whom  we  have  prayed  is  greater  than  we.  His  love  is  a  love  for 
individuals;  but  He  sees  the  part  in  the  whole,  and  time  as 
eternity.  Nature  He  makes  orderly ;  expressing  in  it  His  own 
rationality,  and  thereby  making  possible  for  us  men  the  develop- 
ment of  rational  individuality  in  intelligence,  in  morals,  in  the 
deep  affections  of  a  life  in  which  we  must  help  one  another  as  we 


332     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

can  in  the  presence  of  vast  and  inexorable,  but  not  unintelligible, 
forces.  With  eternal  patience,  with  a  wisdom  beyond  our 
earthly  comprehension,  He  works  out  His  vast  designs  ;  and  into 
those  designs  He  weaves  our  lives ;  so  that  sometimes  the  answer 
we  had  so  eagerly  prayed  for  comes,  but  sometimes  does  not 
come  —  does  not  come,  because  in  its  place  comes  something 
greater,  something  longer  in  its  process  and  wider  in  its  issues, 
leading  us  out  through  slow  years  into  fields  of  life  more  sober 
in  colour  than  those  we  had  planned,  but  greater  in  labour  and 
deeper  in  truth. 

IF  To  her  the  "  special  Shewing  "  came  as  a  gift,  unearned,  and 
unexpected :  it  came  in  an  abundant  answer  to  a  prayer  for  other 
things  needed  by  every  soul.  Julian's  desires  for  herself  were 
for  three  *'  wounds  "  to  be  made  more  deep  in  her  life  :  contrition 
(in  sight  of  sin),  compassion  (in  sight  of  sorrow),  and  longing 
after  God :  she  prayed  and  sought  diligently  for  these  graces, 
comprehensive  as  she  felt  they  were  of  the  Christian  life  and 
meant  for  all ;  and  with  them  she  sought  to  have  for  herself,  in 
particular  regard  to  her  own  difficulties,  a  sight  of  such  truth  as 
it  might  **  behove"  her  to  know  for  the  glory  of  God  and  the 
comfort  of  men.^ 

I  asked  for  just  a  crumb  of  bread. 
Within  His  banquet-hall  He  spread 
A  bounteous  feast  on  every  side — 
My  hungry  soul  was  satisfied. 

I  asked  for  just  a  ray  of  light 
To  guide  me  through  the  gloomy  night. 
And  lo,  there  shone  along  my  way 
The  noon-tide  glory  of  the  day. 

I  asked  for  just  a  little  aid. 
As  I  stood  trembling  and  afraid. 
With  strength  I  had  not  known  before 
He  made  me  more  than  conqueror. 

I  asked  for  just  a  bit  of  love, 
For  love  is  sweet.     From  heaven  above 
The  words  came  now  with  meaning  new, 
"  Upon  the  Cross  I  died  for  you  ".^ 

1  Grace  Warrack,  in  Introduction  to  Julian  of  Norwich's  Revelations  of  Divine 
Love^  xxxvii. 

a  Faith  Wells,  in  The  Sunday  School  Times,  27th  June,  1914. 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER      ^^3 
I. 

No  Answer. 

1.  Whether  prayer  is  answered  or  not  is  always  a  matter 
decided  in  the  last  and  most  important  case  by  the  person  who 
prays.  In  the  secret  of  our  own  heart  is  to  be  found  the  reason 
why  prayer  does  or  does  not  receive  the  response  of  God.  "  A 
man's  soul  is  wont  to  give  him  tidings,  more  than  seven  watchmen 
that  sit  on  high  on  a  watch-tower."  It  is  necessary  that  the 
verdict  be  given,  not  only  upon  the  use  of  the  opportunity  of 
prayer,  but  upon  a  right  use.  Since  prayer  is  a  means  of  the 
essential  discipline  of  life,  the  correction  and  direction  of  our 
desires  thereby  must  qualify  our  expectations.  That  this  or  the 
other  impulse  of  our  own  will  cannot  overrule  the  events  of  life 
is  a  necessary  postulate  of  a  Divinely  ordered  world.  Prayer 
must  count  for  something,  but  it  cannot  count  for  everything. 
Prayer  cannot  spell  anarchy  ;  yet  it  may  so  permeate  and  colour 
our  life  that  we  may  "  pray  without  ceasing,  and  in  everything 
give  thanks  ". 

H  I  remember,  as  a  child,  putting  God  to  the  test.  I  placed  a 
bright  farthing  in  a  drawer,  and  then  knelt  down  and  prayed 
God  to  transmute  it  into  a  half-sovereign.  With  trembling  eager- 
ness I  opened  the  drawer,  and  found  that  the  copper  was  copper 
still.  That  was  my  dawn  of  scepticism  in  prayer.  Some  people 
seem  to  remain  in  that  childish  attitude  all  their  lives,  and  the 
dawn  of  scepticism  waxes  to  the  perfect  day.^ 

2.  Though  we  are  often  unable  to  give  a  reason  why  our 
prayers  are  not  answered,  that  is  not  always  so.  If  we  consider 
the  matter  carefully  we  may  find  that  the  denial  is  due  to  one  or 
other  of  the  following  reasons. 

(1)  Petitions  are  sometimes  denied  because  if  granted  they 
would  bring  us  positive  injury.  True  wisdom,  if  we  had  it, 
would  never  allow  us  to  be  at  cross-purposes  with  God. 

So  weak  is  man, 
So  ignorant  and  blind,  that  did  not  God 
Sometimes  withhold  in  mercy  what  we  ask, 
We  should  be  ruined  at  our  own  request. 

^  B,  F.  Horton,  The  Prayer- House  of  God,  26. 


334    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

And  possibly  if  we  would  all  think  back  a  little  through  our 
own  history  we  could  recall  some  earnest  prayer  of  the  heart, 
some  cry  of  the  soul,  which  later  events  proved  to  be  against  our 
own  best  welfare. 

1[  There  are  people  who  say,  "  What  is  the  limitation  of  the 
promise  ?  If  it  means  anything,  it  means  everything — *  Ask, 
and  ye  shall  receive  ;  seek,  and  ye  shall  find  ;  knock,  and  it  shall 
be  opened  unto  you.'  "  Would  you  grant  your  boy's  request  if 
he  asked  for  something  which  you  knew  to  be  bad  for  him  ? 
Would  a  woman  give  her  child  a  red-hot  poker  if  the  little  child 
asked  for  it  ?  Of  course  it  means  that,  if  it  is  good  for  us,  and 
if  it  is  best  for  us,  it  will  be  given,  but  otherwise  it  will  not  be 
given.  ^ 

(2)  Our  prayer  is  sometimes  denied  in  order  that  a  higher 
and  better  blessing  may  come  to  us.  Earnestly  and  repeatedly 
did  Paul  pray  that  a  certain  thorn  in  his  flesh  might  be  taken 
away  ;  but  God  let  him  know  it  was  a  thing  in  which  he  would 
some  day  glory,  and  when  Paul  looked  back  upon  it  from  the 
close  of  his  life  he  would  tell  those  gathered  about  him  of  the 
special  nearness  of  God  and  the  presence  of  Jesus  which  had  been 
a  millionfold  sweeter  to  him  than  any  fleshly  ease  the  removal  of 
that  ugly  annoying  thorn  might  have  brought  him. 

IF  Sometimes  when  we  have  really  prayed,  for  temporal  bless- 
ings especially,  we  have  been  like  those  who  have  asked  for  a 
penny  with  just  one  definite  bronze  penny  in  view.  We  may  or 
may  not  have  received  our  penny,  but  if  our  prayers  were  from 
good  and  sincere  hearts,  hearts  obedient  to  the  supreme  will,  we 
have  received  pounds  instead  of  our  penny ;  and  by  praying 
more  and  more  in  accord  with  the  Divine  will,  we  may  gain  by 
our  prayers  thousands  and  millions  of  pounds,  in  the  long  run,  for 
God  and  humanity .^ 

(3)  And  still  another  reason  for  unanswered  prayer  is  to  be 
found  in  the  inconsistency  between  our  prayers  and  God's  better 
purposes  of  wisdom  towards  others.  The  unanswered  prayer  of 
Moses  will  illustrate  this.  It  was  a  bitter  blow  which  kept 
Moses  from  entering  with  Israel  into  the  Land  of  Promise. 
So  bravely  he  had  defended  them,  so  patiently  he  had  toiled  for 

1  A.  F.  Winnington  Ingram,  The  Call  of  the  Father,  74. 
3  W.  Arthur  Cornaby,  In  Touch  with  Reality,  243. 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER       335 

them,  so  earnestly  he  had  prayed  and  interceded  for  them,  surely 
he  might  well  expect  to  enter  in.  But  that  little  sin  excludes 
him.  He  prays — he  who  had  obtained  in  his  intercession  the 
turning  away  of  God's  wrath  from  Israel,  he  who  had  stood  before 
them  in  the  gap, — he  prays  now  for  himself  that  he  may  go  across 
and  see  the  glorious  land.  "  But  the  Lord  would  not  hear  me," 
he  says ;  and  why  ?  Not  altogether  as  a  punishment  for  that 
little  sin,  but  because  the  granting  of  that  prayer  would  have 
been  inconsistent  with  the  great  system  of  moral  teaching  by 
which  God  was  educating  Israel.  This  inconsistency  between 
the  prayer  and  the  Diviner  purposes  of  God's  wisdom  to  Israel 
he  speaks  of  as  the  reason  for  its  denial :  "  The  Lord  was  angry 
with  me  for  your  sakes.     The  Lord  would  not  hear  me." 

H  The  good  of  those  who  pray  could  not  be  accomplished  at 
the  expense  of  those  who  do  not  pray, — God  could  not  be  God 
and  act  thus — but  the  accomplishment  of  God's  unvarying  favour 
toward  all  is  contingent  upon  human  faith  ;  and  when  its  accom- 
plishment depends,  as  it  does  depend  in  all  social  things,  upon  the 
increase  of  faith  in  whole  classes  of  men,  it  is  Divine  prescience 
alone  that  can  foresee  the  time  that  will  be  required.  Resignation 
as  to  the  time  of  fulfilment  is  required  in  the  hearts  of  those  who 
pray  for  such  needful  things  as  depend  upon  the  action  of  society, 
but  not  because  God  withholds  the  boon.^ 

3.  The  perplexity  of  unanswered  prayer  is  felt  most  keenly  when 
the  prayer  is  intercessory.  How  often  does  it  happen  that,  in- 
stead of  the  heart  being  cheered,  and  our  confidence  strengthened, 
by  the  blessed  result  of  intercessory  prayer,  on  the  contrary,  the 
very  earnestness  and  faith  of  our  prayer  offers  an  occasion  for  a 
particularly  severe  temptation.  A  broken-hearted  wife,  for  in- 
stance, whose  dissolute  husband  has  wrecked  the  happiness  of  the 
home  and  blighted  her  whole  life,  seems  to  receive  absolutely  no 
answer  to  her  agonized  entreaty.  With  strong  cries  and  tears 
she  has  pleaded  for  his  salvation,  and  yet  he  remains  as  he  was, 
a  curse  to  his  family  and  his  home.  What  wonder  if  the  enemy 
takes  advantage  of  her  distress  to  shake  her  confidence,  either  in 
her  relations  with  God,  if  she  is  of  a  fcimid  and  despondent  tem- 
perament, or  in  God  Himself,  if  she  is  given  to  forming  hasty 

*  Christus  Futurus,  63. 


336    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

conclusions,  and  is  not  altogether  indisposed  to  yield  to  sceptical 
misgivings  ? 

The  answer  to  these  perplexities  is  to  be  found  in  the  recog- 
nition of  the  fact  that  intercessory  prayer  is  a  part  of  Christian 
work  and  shares  in  the  limitations  that  belong  to  all  service  on 
behalf  of  others.  All  that  the  most  skilful  and  gifted  worker  for 
God  can  do  is  to  liberate  the  Divine  power  by  complying  with 
Divinely  appointed  conditions  of  effort.  It  goes  without  saying 
that  no  man  can  of  himself  impart  spiritual  life,  and  yet  it  is  the 
promise  of  Christ  to  the  true  believer  that  forth  from  his  body 
shall  flow  rivers  of  living  water.  We  do  not  say  that  it  is  of  no 
use  to  work  for  souls,  because  we  know  that  no  effort  of  ours  can 
produce  those  spiritual  results  that  we  long  to  see,  unless  not 
only  God  shall  work  through  us  but  man,  for  whom  we  work, 
shall  yield  to  the  influence  thus  brought  to  bear  upon  him.  We 
know  that  it  is  God's  will  thus  to  use  our  efforts,  and  that  it  is 
our  duty  to  expect,  with  heartfelt  faith,  to  be  used  of  Him.  But 
when  we  have  done  all  that  love  can  do,  we  may  fail,  even  as  our 
Master  failed,  to  carry  the  day  with  wilful  wayward  men,  who 
do  always  resist  alike  the  Spirit  of  God  and  the  kindly  offices  of 
their  fellow-men.  Our  Lord  Himself  tells  us  that  He  had  failed 
to  gather  those  whom  He  sought  to  gather,  and  yet  there  was  no 
fault  or  defect  in  His  service ;  and  if  He  failed,  surely  it  is  not 
surprising  that  our  poor,  imperfect  efforts  should  fail  from  the 
same  cause,  even  where  the  failure  is  not  due  to  our  lack  of  skill 
or  of  earnestness. 

If  this  be  so  with  our  spiritually  philanthropic  efforts,  is  it  a 
thing  to  be  surprised  at  that  our  intercessory  prayers  should  have 
a  like  issue  ?  Our  efforts  are  not  thrown  away  because  they  do 
not  seem  to  be  crowned  with  the  success  that  we  desired.  Our 
Divine  Master  did  not  really  fail,  although  He  did  not  accomplish 
what  He  had  longed  to  accomplish  among  His  contemporaries. 
Even  so,  we  may  feel  assured  that  no  earnest  effort  for  God  and 
good  that  is  wrought  in  the  power  of  the  Holy  Ghost  will  in  the 
end  be  found  to  have  been  destitute  of  all  beneficial  consequence. 
It  will,  at  least,  have  benefited  him  who  wrought  it,  if  it  has 
benefited  no  one  else.  And,  analogously,  no  earnest,  believing 
intercessory  prayer  will  be  altogether  lost ;  it  must  at  least  con- 
tribute to  the  spiritual  development  of  him  who  has  offered  it, 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER       337 

and  perhaps  as  a  contribution  to  the  sum  total  of  intercession 
the  wide  world  over,  may  have  other  and  far-reaching  conse- 
quences, of  which  at  present  we  can  scarcely  form  an  idea. 

If  Some  months  ago  an  intelligent  and  devout  woman  whose 
daughter  had  died  after  a  painful  illness  said  to  me  :  "I  fear  that 
I  have  lost  my  faith  in  prayer.  Once  my  faith  was  strong.  I 
used  to  pray  with  confidence  for  anything  I  needed,  believing 
that  if  I  asked  in  Jesus's  name,  and  had  strong  faith,  God  would 
give  me  what  I  asked  for.  I  had  been  taught  so  to  pray  and 
believe.  When  my  child  was  sick  I  besought  God  with  an  agony 
of  desire  for  her  recovery.  I  asked  in  Jesus's  name.  I  believed 
that  God  would  grant  my  prayer.  When  the  doctor  said  she 
could  not  live  I  refused  to  believe  him,  declaring  that  God,  who  had 
promised  to  hear  my  prayer,  would  surely  heal  her.  I  fully  believed 
that  in  some  way  God  would  do  what  the  physicians  thought 
impossible.  When  she  died  I  was  stunned,  not  merely  because 
of  my  grief,  but  because  it  seemed  to  me  that  God  had  failed  me. 
The  faith  in  which  I  had  been  reared,  and  which,  up  to  that 
moment,  had  been  for  me  absolute  truth,  crumbled  into  dust.  At 
first  I  was  embittered  and  hostile.  Then  I  passed  into  indifference. 
It  was  a  long  time  before  I  could  pray  at  all.  Then  I  gradually 
resumed  the  habit  of  prayer,  but  never  with  the  old  confidence ; 
I  pray  now  because  I  tnink  it  is  right  to  pray,  but  my  unquestion- 
ing faith  in  prayer  is  gone."  This  incident,  which  I  believe  to 
be  typical,  caused  me  to  restudy  the  question  of  prayer,  for  it 
seemed  to  me  that  this  woman  was  a  victim  of  wrong  teaching. 
She  had,  in  a  word,  been  led  to  substitute  faith  in  prayer  for 
faith  in  God.^ 

IF  When  Captain  Hedley  Vicars  was  in  the  Crimean  War,  Miss 
Marshall,  the  lady  to  whom  he  was  engaged,  and  her  aunt,  Miss 
Marsh,  prayed  continually  that  his  life  might  be  spared.  He  was, 
as  we  know,  shot ;  but  the  ladies  came  in  time  to  see  that  after 
all  their  prayers  were  not  unanswered,  and  confessed  as  much 
in  these  words,  "  We  asked  life  of  thee,  and  thou  gavest  him  long 
life,  even  for  ever  and  ever  ".^ 

II. 

Deferred  Answer. 

Properly  speaking,  then,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  unanswered 
prayer,  if  the  conditions  of  true  prayer  are  fulfilled.     No  doubt 

1 C.  W.  McCormick,  The  Heart  of  Prayer,  5. 
3E.  J.  Hardy,  Doubt  and  Faith,  161. 
22 


338     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

men  may  utter  words  which  are  called  prayer,  and  there  may  be 
no  response.  But  real  prayer  must  always  be  answered — answered 
in  some  way,  answered  at  some  time.  Our  prayers  cannot  lie  in 
God's  presence  like  letters  on  the  table  of  a  busy  or  neglectful 
man.  He  never  said  to  any  son  of  Jacob,  "  Seek  ye  me  in  vain  ". 
In  all  labour  there  is  profit,  and  this  labour  of  prayer  must  be 
the  most  profitable  of  all  toils,  when  the  soil  in  which  we  sow  is 
God.  We  do  not  read  in  Scripture  of  a  single  unanswered  prayer 
offered  up  by  any  of  His  people.  It  is  true  the  special  petition 
was  sometimes  denied,  but  even  then  it  was  granted  in  some 
higher  form  than  the  suppliant  dreamt  of.  Even  though  Moses, 
so  habitually  successful  in  his  supplications,  was  denied  in  his 
request  to  go  up  with  his  people  to  the  Promised  Land,  yet  how 
wondrously  was  his  prayer  answered.  Not  only  was  he  permitted 
to  see  the  inheritance  of  Israel  from  the  top  of  Pisgah,  but  ages 
afterwards  he  visited  it  in  the  company  of  Elijah,  and  stood  on 
the  Holy  Mount  with  Jesus  Himself.  Who  then  can  venture  to 
say  that  the  prayer  of  Moses,  which  seemed  to  be  denied,  was 
overlooked  or  forgotten  ?  Therefore  we  assert  that  there  is  no 
such  thing  as  unanswered  prayer,  and  that  when  prayer  seems 
unanswered,  the  answer  is  only  the  more  wonderful  and  glorious. 

But  God  does  certainly  delay  the  answer  to  prayer,  and  this 
causes  surprise.  We  know  it  is  God's  will  to  give  us  these  things, 
and  we  may  pray  without  limitation.     Why,  then,  the  delay  ? 

1.  The  difficulty  is,  without  doubt,  a  serious  one.  It  is  not 
only  that,  in  itself,  the  delay  causes  disappointment,  but  to  minds 
untrained  in  their  thoughts  of  the  attributes  and  purposes  of  God, 
and  therefore  unable  to  grasp  any  larger  view  of  His  working 
in  the  world,  an  answer  long-deferred  seems  to  be  inconsistent 
with  His  love.  To  minimize  such  a  difficulty,  either  in  our  own 
case  or  in  that  of  others,  is  not  really  the  way  to  meet  it.  But 
it  may  be  pointed  out  that  we  have  had  full  warning  of  this  trial 
from  the  Incarnate  Lord,  whose  love  is  proved  by  the  sacrifice  of 
Himself ;  in  His  own  human  experience  He  has  met  the  trial,  and 
can  therefore  sympathize ;  we  have  from  His  lips  an  assurance 
that  an  answer  will  come  :  "  Shall  not  God  avenge  his  elect,  which 
cry  to  him  day  and  night,  and  he  is  longsufFering  over  them  ?  I 
say  unto  you,  that  he  will  avenge  them  speedily.     Howbeit  when 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER       339 

the  Son  of  man  cometh,  shall  he  find  faith  on  the  earth  ? "  In 
that  assurance  there  is  a  clue  to  the  mystery  of  those  delays  in 
the  Divine  response  to  our  requests.  Other  purposes  of  God 
besides  an  answer  to  the  cry  of  His  elect  await  accomplishment ; 
when  those  purposes  are  fulfilled,  the  accomplishment  of  their 
desire  will  be  speedy  and  complete.  And,  as  His  operation  in 
the  Church  or  in  the  world  is  very  slow  to  our  eyes,  we  may  by 
analogy  argue  that  His  meaning  in  long  delay,  as  regards  our- 
selves, is  that  He  has  in  our  own  lives  purposes  to  fulfil  which, 
from  the  human  point  of  view,  are  slowly  developed.  A  test  so 
searching  draws  ever  from  the  Lord  Himself  the  question  whether, 
at  His  coming,  He  would  find  on  the  earth  faith  strong  enough 
to  bear  it.  Patience,  toil,  and  co-operation  with  the  slow  pro- 
cesses of  God  are  suggested  by  St.  James's  metaphor  of  "the 
husbandman,"  who  "waiteth  for  the  precious  fruit  of  the  earth," 
as  he  bade  suffering  Christians  "  stablish  their  hearts,"  and  en- 
couraged them  to  prayer.  We  see  in  his  words  the  confidence  of 
such  Hebrew  teachers  as  those  who  wrote  the  Thirty-seventh  or 
the  Seventy-third  Psalm,  and  also  the  larger  thoughts  of  "  the 
wise  men  "  of  Israel,  as  they  pondered  the  ways  of  God  which, 
since  the  Incarnation,  have  been  irradiated  with  Christian  hope. 

He  prayed,  but  to  his  prayer  no  answer  came. 

And  choked  within  him  sank  his  ardour's  flame ; 

No  more  he  prayed,  no  more  the  knee  he  bent, 

While  round  him  darkened  doubt  and  discontent ; 

Till  in  his  room,  one  eve,  there  shone  a  light. 

And  he  beheld  an  angel-presence  bright, 

Who  said :  "  O  faint  heart,  why  hast  thou  resigned 

Praying,  and  no  more  callest  God  to  mind  ?  " 

"  I  prayed,"  he  said,  "  but  no  one  heard  my  prayer, 

Long  disappointment  has  induced  despair." 

"  Fool !  "  said  the  angel,  "  every  prayer  of  thine, 

Of  God's  immense  compassion  was  a  sign ; 

Each  cry  of  thine,  *  0  Lord  I '  itself  contains 

The  answer,  '  Here  am  I ' ;  thy  very  pains, 

Ardoiu-,  and  love  and  longing,  every  tear 

Are  His  attraction,  prove  Him  very  near." 

The  cloud  dispersed ;  once  more  the  suppliant  prayed. 

Nor  ever  failed  to  find  the  promised  aid.^ 

1  Jalaluddin  Kumi,  in  A  Little  Book  of  Easterfi  Wisdom,  49. 


i. 


340    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

2.  The  answer  may  be  delayed  as  a  means  of  spiritual  discipline. 
We  are  here  to  be  educated,  and  God  knows  best  how  to  time  His 
good  gifts  to  that  end.  Humility,  patience,  and  hope  ;  how  much 
we  need  such  virtues  as  these  and  a  faith  that 

Knows  Omnipotence  has  heard  her  prayer, 
And  cries,  It  shall  be  done — sometime,  somewhere ; 

and  what  heavenly  graces  are  to-day  adorning  many  a  soul  be- 
cause of  a  period  of  suffering  hard  to  bear  and  a  good  deal  harder 
to  understand,  except  for  the  sweet  knowledge  that  God's  best 
is  being  accomplished,  and  that  some  glad  day  "  the  whole  of  life's 
painful  experience  will  be  poured  into  song  before  the  throne  ". 

H  If  Jacob's  desire  had  been  given  to  him  in  time  for  him  to 
get  a  good  night's  rest,  he  might  never  have  become  the  prince  of 
prayer  we  know  to-day.  If  Hannah's  prayer  for  a  son  had  been 
answered  at  the  time  she  set  for  herself,  the  nation  might  never 
have  known  the  mighty  man  of  God  it  found  in  Samuel. 
Hannah  wanted  only  a  son,  but  God  wanted  more.  He  wanted 
a  prophet,  a  ruler,  and  a  saviour  for  His  people.  Some  one  has 
said  that  in  this  instance  "  God  had  to  get  a  woman  before  He 
could  get  a  man".  This  woman  He  got  in  Hannah  precisely  by 
delaying  the  answer  to  her  prayer,  for  out  of  the  discipline  of 
those  weeks  and  months  and  years  there  came  a  woman  with  a 
vision  like  God's,  with  tempered  soul  and  gentle  spirit  and 
seasoned  will,  prepared  to  be  the  kind  of  a  mother  for  the  kind  of 
a  man  God  knew  the  nation  needed.^ 

3.  The  answer  may  be  delayed  by  the  very  force  of  circum- 
stances. You  want  to  know  if  God  cannot  overcome  these 
instanter  ?  Yes,  He  doubtless  can,  but  it  is  hardly  the  part  of 
reverent  trust  to  ask  Him  to  do  the  miraculous  if  He  can  do  this 
thing  in  His  own  good  time  in  any  other  way.  Impatience  with 
God  is  the  meanest  sort  of  distrust.  To  pray  for  the  instant 
healing  of  a  diseased  body  is  to  ignore  every  secondary  cause  and 
every  law  of  nature  and  to  ask  God  to  do  the  same,  and  to  show 
that  we  fear  not  so  much  for  His  glory  as  for  our  own  gratifica- 
tion. May  not  the  same  thing  be  true  in  some  instances  when 
prayer  is  sent  up  for  the  instant  conversion  of  some  soul?  In 
fact,  of  the  two  is  not  the  former  much  more  reasonable  ?     God 

i  W.  E.  Biederwolf.  How  Can  God  Ansiver  Prayer  ?  232. 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER      341 

can  handle  the  laws  of  nature  as  He  will,  but  can  He  thus  handle 
a  human  will  and  still  leave  the  individual  a  free,  moral,  and  re- 
sponsible agent  ?  A  man's  will  must  be  influenced  by  motives  ; 
the  evil  of  sin  must  be  seen  and  something  of  the  character  of 
God  appreciated.  The  power  of  these  motives  depends  a  good 
deal  upon  their  proper  presentation  by  the  proper  person  and  at 
the  proper  time.  We  do  not  need  to  explain  why,  but  just  to 
recognize  what  God  has  shown  us  to  be  true,  that  He  has  chosen 
to  limit  Himself  very  largely  to  human  instrumentality  in  saving 
another  man's  soul.  God  will  not  coerce  a  man's  will,  but  He 
may  remove  him  from  influences  that  have  made  it  hard  for  him 
to  be  reached  and  bring  him  into  new  surroundings  that  may 
lead  to  the  saving  of  his  soul.  In  all  these  things  the  element 
of  time  must  not  be  ignored. 

1[  God  in  His  dealings  with  souls  will  act  with  the  wisdom 
which  is  His  Divine  characteristic,  and  seize  such  opportunities 
of  influencing  human  hearts  as  He  shall  best  be  able  to  turn  to 
good  account.  Hence  it  will  not  follow  that  our  intercession  has 
failed  of  its  purpose  because  no  special  influence  has  been  brought 
to  bear  on  the  person  prayed  for  just  at  the  moment  that  the 
prayer  was  oflfered.  God  may  be  abiding  His  time,  not  because 
He  is  in  no  hurry  to  bless  or  to  save,  but  because  He  well  knows 
that  He  can  make  His  influence  all  the  more  felt  by  deferring  its 
use  for  a  season.^ 

IT  Here  is  a  story  which  was  told  one  Sunday  in  an  Arran 
pulpit  by  one  who  knew  the  persons  it  concerned.  There  lived 
in  a  quiet  village  a  godly  man.  And  he  had  a  wife  and  three 
sons.  His  wife  died,  and  the  burden  of  bringing  up  these  sons 
fell  on  him.  He  cried  to  God  to  help  him.  Now,  it  so  happened 
that  in  that  house  there  was  a  rush-bottomed  chair,  the  only  chair 
of  that  sort  in  the  house,  and  it  was  at  that  chair  this  good  man 
knelt  when  he  prayed  for  his  boys  as  well  as  at  family  prayer. 
And  often  when  alone  he  spent  long  whiles  on  his  knees  praying 
for  their  conversion.  But  he  saw  no  change  in  his  sons ;  they 
were  hard,  selfish,  and  worldly.  At  last  one  by  one  they  all  left 
him,  and  went  into  business  in  some  great  city  of  the  land.  They 
prospered  in  business,  but  not  in  religion.  But  business  prosperity 
is  not  joy,  and  prosperity  was  making  them  hard.  The  father 
prayed  the  more  earnestly  that  they  might  gain  their  own  souls, 
although  they  should  lose  the  whole  world.     But  at  the  end  of 

^  Canon  Hay  Aitken,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer,  169. 


342     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

his  days  they  were  not  saved.  There  was  an  old  servant  who 
lived  in  the  house,  and  to  her  he  said  when  he  was  dying,  "I  will 
pray  now  that  my  death  may  be  used  by  God  to  save  them". 
Then  he  died.  The  three  young  men  came  home  to  the  funeral. 
And  when  all  was  past,  they  said :  "  What  shall  we  do  with  the 
house  and  the  old  furniture  ?  "  One  said :  *'  Let  them  go  to  the 
old  woman  who  has  taken  care  of  him  ".  But  the  eldest  son 
said :  "  Well,  I  consent  if  only  you  will  allow  me  to  get  the  rush- 
bottomed  chair.  I  never  heard  prayers  like  those  I  heard  there. 
I  hear  those  prayers  still  when  I  am  at  business.  I  think  if  I 
had  the  chance  I  would  not  live  the  prayerless  life  I  am  living 
now."  And  the  other  two  were  softened.  And  with  that  the 
Spirit  of  the  Lord  came  upon  the  eldest  brother,  and  he  said : 
"Let  us  kneel  around  it  once  more  and  pray".  And  they  did. 
And  with  great  crying  and  tears  they  spent  that  afternoon 
together.  And  the  end  of  all  was  that  the  two  younger  brothers 
gave  up  their  business  and  offered  themselves  to  the  mission-field. 
And  they  are  well  known  as  missionaries  now.  And  the  eldest 
brother  is  one  of  those  whose  praise  is  in  all  the  churches.^ 

4.  There  are  some  prayers  which  are  answered  only  by  the 
promise,  of  an  answer.  The  centurion  prays  for  his  servant  that 
he  may  be  healed  instantaneously ;  the  immediate  response  is, 
"  I  will  come  ".  Have  we  never  experienced  this  ?  We  have  asked 
something  which  has  not  at  once  been  granted,  and  yet  we  have 
been  made  to  feel  that  there  was  something  more  than  silence. 
We  have  felt  in  our  hearts  what  seemed  the  prophecy  of  an 
answer,  a  nameless,  unspeakable  strength  which  told  us  it  would 
one  day  all  be  well.  The  summer  did  not  come  immediately,  but 
the  swallows  came  into  our  spring,  and  the  interpretation  of  their 
song  was  this,  "  It  will  come  ". 

IT  My  soul,  do  not  despise  thy  moments  of  anticipation.  They 
have  no  present  gifts  to  bring,  but  they  bring  the  promise  of 
great  gifts  to  come ;  they  have  no  immediate  answer  to  thy 
prayer,  but  they  tell  thee  of  a  time  when  thy  prayer  will  be 
answered.  Thinkest  thou  it  is  a  light  thing  to  have  such 
moments  ?  Great  men  have  lived  on  them  and  died  on  them. 
Did  not  Abraham  leave  his  country  and  his  father's  house  with 
no  other  food  in  his  heart  than  the  strength  of  a  promise  ?  Was 
it  not  that  promise  that  helped  him  to  cBmb  the  Mount  Moriahs 
of  life,  and  to  meet  on  their  summits  the  great  sacrifices  to  which 

1  Alexander  Macleod,  The  Child  Jesus,  98, 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER      343 

life  is  heir ;  he  was  made  strong  by  the  power  of  aspiration,  by 
the  voice  which  each  morning  said  to  him,  "  I  will  come  ".  So 
shalt  thou  too  be  strong,  O  my  soul.  If  thou  shalt  set  out  on  thy 
journey  with  the  prophecy  of  an  answered  prayer,  thou  too  shalt 
climb  Mount  Moriah  with  unfaltering  feet,  thou  too  with  un- 
blanched  cheek  shalt  meet  the  sacrifice  on  its  summit.  The  glory 
of  to-morrow  shall  prefigure  itself  through  the  tears  of  to-day, 
and  the  song  of  the  approaching  swallows  shall  be  heard  amid  the 
snow ;  all  shadows  vanish  from  that  heart  to  which  God  has  said, 
"I  will  come ".1 

5.  If  the  answer  is  delayed,  we  ought  to  ask  ourselves  if  that 
which  we  desire  is  truly  according  to  the  will  of  God;  and  if 
we  are  satisfied  that  it  is,  we  ought  to  continue  "instant  in 
prayer  ".  Bengel  gives  his  judgment  that  "  a  Christian  should 
not  leave  off^  praying  till  his  Heavenly  Father  give  him  leave,  by 
permitting  him  to  obtain  something  ".  And  George  Miiller  drew 
encouragement  from  the  fact  that  he  had  been  enabled  to  per- 
severe in  prayer  daily,  during  twenty-nine  years,  for  a  certain 
spiritual  blessing  long  withheld :  "  At  home  and  abroad,  in  this 
country  and  in  foreign  lands,  in  health  and  in  sickness,  however 
much  occupied,  I  have  been  enabled  day  by  day,  by  God's  help, 
to  bring  this  matter  before  Him,  and  still  I  have  not  the  full 
answer  yet.  Nevertheless,  I  look  for  it.  I  expect  it  confidently. 
The  very  fact  that  day  after  day,  and  year  after  year,  for  twenty- 
nine  years,  the  Lord  has  enabled  me  to  continue  patiently,  be- 
lievingly,  to  wait  on  Him  for  the  blessing,  still  further  encourages 
me  to  wait  on ;  and  so  fully  am  I  assured  that  God  hears  me 
about  this  matter  that  I  have  often  been  enabled  to  praise  Him 
beforehand  for  the  full  answer  which  I  shall  ultimately  receive  to 
my  prayers  on  this  subject." 

IT  Moses  desired  to  pass  over  Jordan  with  the  tribes  ;  but 
Jehovah  said  to  him,  "Speak  no  more  unto  me  of  this  matter". 
Paul  besought  the  Lord  thrice  that  the  thorn  which  rankled  in 
his  flesh  might  be  withdrawn,  but  the  only  response  vouchsafed 
was,  "  My  grace  is  sufficient  for  thee ".  John,  the  beloved 
disciple,  encourages  us  to  pray  for  the  salvation  of  our  brethren, 
but  even  as  we  address  ourselves  to  this  holy  duty  he  reminds  us 

*  G.  Matheeon,  Moments  on  the  Mount,  147, 


344   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

that  "  there  is  a  sin  unto  death,"  in  the  face  of  which,  apparently, 
prayer  will  not  prevail.^ 

Unanswered  yet,  the  prayer  your  lips  have  pleaded, 

In  agony  of  heart  these  many  years  ? 
Does  faith  begin  to  fail  ?     Is  hope  departing, 

And  think  you  all  in  vain  those  falling  tears  ? 
Say  not  the  Father  hath  not  heard  your  prayer ; 
You  shall  have  your  desire  sometime,  somewhere. 

Unanswered  yet,  though  when  you  first  presented 

This  one  petition  at  the  Father's  Throne, 
It  seemed  you  could  not  wait  the  time  of  asking, 

So  urgent  was  your  heart  to  have  it  known  ? 
Though  years  have  passed  since  then,  do  not  despair ; 
The  Lord  will  answer  j^-ou  sometime,  somewhere. 

Unanswered  yet  ?     Nay,  do  not  say  ungranted ; 

Perhaps  your  part  is  not  yet  wholly  done ; 
The  work  began  when  first  your  prayer  was  uttered, 

And  God  will  finish  what  He  has  begun. 
If  you  will  keep  the  incense  burning  there, 
His  glory  you  will  see  sometime,  somewhere. 

Unanswered  yet  ?     Faith  cannot  be  unanswered, 

Her  feet  are  firmly  planted  on  the  rock  ; 
Amid  the  wildest  storms  she  stands  undaunted. 

Nor  quails  before  the  loudest  thunder  shock. 
She  knows  Omnipotence  has  heard  her  prayer, 
And  cries,  It  shall  be  done — sometime,  somewhere. 

III. 

Different  Answer. 

1.  A  prayer  is  not  unanswered  because  it  is  not  answered  as 
we  wished.  We  can  see  now,  as  we  look  back  on  that  strange 
scene  in  the  Garden,  how  it  was  love  for  His  own  Son,  as  well 
as  love  for  man,  that  led  the  Father  to  send  the  answer  in  His 
own  way ;  and  shall  we  not  some  day  make  similar  discoveries 
about  what  seem  to  have  been  our  unanswered  prayers  ?  When 
all  the  mysteries  of  life  are  at  last  unravelled,  and  we  clearly  see 

1 D.  M.  Molntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  161. 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER       345 

how  truly  goodness  and  mercy  have  followed  us  all  the  days  of 
our  life,  shall  we  not  discover  that  our  prayers  which  seemed  un- 
answered, though  offered  with  all  the  faith  and  earnestness  of 
which  we  are  capable,  have  really  been  the  most  fully  answered 
of  any  ?  And  for  these,  perad venture,  rather  than  for  any  others, 
we  may  find  ourselves  specially  constrained  to  praise  God. 

IT  Men  fight  and  lose  the  battle,  and  the  thing  that  they 
fought  for  comes  about  in  spite  of  their  defeat,  and  when  it 
comes  turns  out  not  to  be  what  they  meant,  and  other  men  have 
to  fight  for  what  they  meant  under  another  name.^ 

IF  General  Gordon,  of  Atlanta,  Ga.,  told  me  of  how  the  Con- 
federate troops  prayed  for  victory  before  the  battle  of  Sharps- 
burg.  The  day  before  the  battle  they  prayed  earnestly  that  they 
might  be  victorious,  so  earnestly  that  both  officers  and  men  felt 
that  their  prayers  would  be  answered.  General  Gordon  said 
that  many  felt  satisfied  that  the  Confederate  forces  would  sweep 
the  Union  lines,  and  would  be  on  their  way  to  Washington 
within  a  week.  But  the  next  day  the  battle  came  off,  and  in 
results  it  was  one  of  the  most  crushing  blows  that  the  Confeder- 
ates received  during  the  war.  General  Gordon,  who  was  shot 
five  times,  said  that  after  the  battle  the  men  were  discouraged. 
They  felt  that  God  was  on  the  side  of  the  largest  legions.  Some 
of  the  officers  suggested  that  it  would  be  better  to  spend  less 
time  in  praying  and  more  time  in  manufacturing  powder  and 
bullets.  The  suggestion  seemed  to  be  a  good  one  even  to  the 
General.  But  he  told  me  years  after  that  the  prayers  of  the 
Confederates  on  the  day  before  that  battle  were  best  answered  by 
defeat ;  that  if  the  Confederates  had  captured  Washington  and 
defeated  the  Union  bur  nation  would  now  be  far  down  the  scale 
among  the  weaker  nations  of  the  earth. ^ 

2.  God  often  answers  our  prayers  while  we  are  still  knocking, 
and  in  a  better  way  than  we  asked  for.  We  pray  for  physical 
good,  and  God  answers  with  spiritual  life.  We  pray  to  be  freed 
from  the  burden,  and  God  answers  with  patience  and  strength  to 
endure.  We  pray  to  be  spared  the  conflict,  and  God  gives  us 
courage  to  fight  the  good  fight  of  faith.  The  great  end  of  re- 
ligious effort  is  a  developed  soul,  a  soul  with  a  deep  sense  of  God, 
a  soul  in  which  faith,  courage,  and  resolution  are  at  their  highest. 
That  these  things  be  attained  is  the  greatest  of  blessings ;  they 

1  William  Morris.  2  r,  jj.  Conwell,  How  to  Live  the  Christ  Life,  38. 


346    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

are  God's  best  gift  to  us.  The  soul  that  prays  for  patience,  and 
has  patience  enough  to  continue  praying  when  Heaven  seems 
deaf  or  dead,  has  been  answered,  though  it  knows  it  not.  The 
soul  that  prays  for  energy  and  resolution,  and  finds  its  resolve 
to  get  the  blessing  growing  stronger  with  each  new  rebuff,  has 
already  been  answered.  While  we  deem  ourselves  forsaken  and 
unheard,  the  answer  is  going  on.  Faith  has  grown  stronger, 
resolve  has  taken  deeper  root,  the  hunger  and  thirst  after  right- 
eousness has  increased,  manhood  has  been  nourished,  and  if,  at 
last,  the  direct  and  visible  answer  to  our  prayer  should  come,  the 
direct  blessing  would  not  compare  with  the  benedictions  which 
have  come  from  its  delay. 

IF  Dr.  George  M.  Baker  told  once  about  a  prayer  which  he 
made  when  he  was  a  boy,  asking  God  that  he  might  go  to  a  base- 
ball game.  His  mother  did  not  wish  him  to  go  in  consequence  of 
the  character  of  the  crowd  that  would  be  there.  But  he  prayed 
three  tim.es  that  his  mother  might  change  her  mind.  He  could 
not  understand  why  she  still  stood  to  her  original  position.  He 
went  back  to  his  work  and  began  to  think.  He  thought  of  how 
his  mother  loved  him  much  more  than  any  of  the  boys  loved 
him,  and  how  he  loved  her  more  than  he  loved  them.  So  at  last 
he  began  to  feel  that  he  did  not  care  to  go  to  the  game  ;  and  he 
went  and  told  his  mother  so,  and  told  her  that  he  had  given  up 
the  idea.  He  would  not  go  if  she  gave  him  permission,  for  he 
would  prefer  to  stay  at  home  and  help  her.  His  prayer  was 
answered,  although  not  in  the  way  he  expected — not  by  permit- 
ting him  to  go  to  the  ball  game,  but  by  reconciling  him  to  stay  at 
home.  Dr.  Baker's  lovely  and  potent  life  was  largely  shaped  by 
that  prayer.^ 

3.  We  may  be  inclined  to  say  that  to  have  a  thing  in  another 
shape  is  equivalent  to  not  having  it  at  all.  But  if  we  knew  God, 
we  would  leave  that  to  Him.  He  is  not  mocked,  and  He  will  not 
mock.  He  knows  us  better  than  we  know  ourselves.  He  will 
deal  with  us  not  as  the  children  of  a  day,  but  as  children  of 
eternal  ages.  We  shall  be  satisfied,  if  we  will  but  let  Him  have 
His  way  with  the  creature  He  has  made.  The  question  is  be- 
tween our  will  and  the  will  of  God  He  is  not  one  of  those  who 
give  readiest  what  they  prize  least.  He  does  not  care  to  give 
anything  but  His  best,  or  that  which  will  prepare  for  it.  Not 
1  R.  H.  Conwell,  How  to  Live  the  Christ  Life,  87. 


THE  PERPLEXITIES  OF  PRAYER      347 

many  years  may  pass  before  we  confess,  "  Thou  art  a  God  who 
hearest  prayer,  and  givest  a  better  answer  ".  We  may  come  to 
see  that  the  deepest  desire  of  our  heart  would  have  been  frus- 
trated by  having  what  seemed  its  embodiment  then. 

IF  That  God  should  as  a  loving  Father  listen,  hear,  consider, 
and  deal  with  the  request  after  the  perfect  tenderness  of  His 
heart  is  to  me  enough ;  it  is  little  that  I  should  go  without  what 
I  pray  for.  If  it  be  granted  that  any  answer  which  did  not  come 
of  love,  and  was  not  for  the  final  satisfaction  of  him  who  prayed, 
would  be  unworthy  of  God ;  that  it  is  the  part  of  love  and  know- 
ledge to  watch  over  the  wayward,  ignorant  child ;  then  the 
trouble  of  seemingly  unanswered  prayers  begins  to  abate,  and  a 
lovely  hope  and  comfort  takes  its  place  in  the  child-like  soul.  To 
hear  is  not  necessarily  to  grant — God  forbid !  but  to  hear  is 
necessarily  to  attend  to — sometimes  as  necessarily  to  refuse.^ 

4.  In  intercession  for  others  the  same  law  is  observable. 
Many  an  anxious  mother,  as  she  prays  for  a  difficult  and  wayward 
child,  and  finds  that  the  boon  is  not  yielded  exactly  in  the  way 
by  which  she  had  sought  it,  might  remember  that  it  was  through 
a  petition,  in  its  exact  form,  refused  in  love,  that  the  conversion 
of  St.  Augustine  was  accomplished.  His  mother's  desire  and 
earnest  prayer  was  that  her  son  might  not  sail  for  Italy,  so 
greatly  did  she  dread  for  him  the  temptations  which  would  meet 
him  there.  With  many  tears  she  prayed  that  he  might  not  sail. 
**  But  Thou,"  writes  Augustine,  "  in  the  depth  of  Thy  counsel  and 
hearing  the  hinge  of  her  desire  (that  on  which  all  her  prayer 
turned),  regardedst  not  what  she  then  asked,  that  Thou  mightest 
make  me  what  she  ever  asked."  It  was  in  Italy  that  her  son 
found  Christ.  May  we  not,  in  another  sphere,  discern  as  plainly 
that  prayer  in  the  name  of  Christ  received  a  most  true  answer 
although  the  immediate  petition  was  refused  ? 

IF  A  father  of  a  family  lay  on  his  death-bed.  There  was  only 
one  thought  that  caused  him  anxiety.  He  had  a  number  of  sons 
about  whose  religious  condition  he  had  long  been  greatly  distressed. 
He  could  make  no  impression  upon  them  by  anything  he  could 
say.  His  hope  and  prayer  was  that  by  his  death  he  might  be 
allowed  to  do  what  he  had  not  been  able  to  do  in  his  life.  The 
prayer  was  answered,  but  most  strangely.  He  had  supposed  that, 
if  only  his  end  might  be  bright  and  triumphant,  they  would  be 

*  George  MacDouald,  Unspoken  Sermons,  ii,  70, 


348    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

constrained  to  acknowledge  that  there  was  some  reality  and  power 
in  religion.  What  actually  occurred  was  this.  As  his  close  drew 
near,  he  fell  into  the  deepest  gloom  of  depression.  There  seemed 
to  be  no  gleam  of  comfort,  no  ray  of  light.  And  under  the  cloud 
he  died.  His  sons  watched  it  all,  and  when  it  was  over,  one  of 
them  said  to  the  rest :  "  If  our  father,  who  was  always  a  good 
man,  died  like  that,  how  must  we  expect  to  die  when  our  time 
comes  ?  "  It  was  the  turning-point  in  their  lives.  The  prayer 
had  been  answered,  but  not  in  the  least  in  the  way  that  had  been 
expected.  1 

Oft  when  of  God  we  ask 

For  fuller,  happier  life, 
He  sets  us  some  new  task 

Involving  care  and  strife  : 
Is  this  the  boon  for  which  we  sought  ? 
Has  prayer  new  trouble  on  us  brought  ? 

This  is  indeed  the  boon, 

Though  strange  to  us  it  seems  ; 
We  pierce  the  rock,  and  soon 

The  blessing  on  us  streams ; 
For  when  we  are  the  most  athirst. 
Then  the  clear  waters  on  us  burst. 

We  toil  as  in  a  field, 

Wherein,  to  us  unknown, 
A  treasure  lies  concealed. 

Which  may  be  all  our  own  : 
And  shall  we  of  the  toil  complain 
That  speedily  will  bring  such  gain  ? 

We  dig  the  wells  of  life, 

And  God  the  waters  gives  ; 
We  win  our  way  by  strife. 

Then  He  within  us  lives  ; 
And  only  war  could  make  us  meet 
For  peace  so  sacred  and  so  sweet.^ 

i  A.  W.  Robinson,  The  Voice  of  Joy  and  Health,  64. 
»  T.  T.  Lynch,  The  Rivulet. 


XVII. 
Answers  to  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H.,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 

Bounds,  E.  M.,  Purpose  in  Prayer  (1914). 

Bowne,  B.  P.,  The  Essence  of  Religion  (1911). 

Carpenter,  W.  B.,  Thoughts  on  Prayer  (1907). 

Gordon,  S.  D.,  The  Quiet  Time. 

Harris,  J.  R.,  The  Guiding  Hand  of  God  (1914). 

Haughton,  W.,  Twentieth  Century  Miracles  (1907). 

Hortou,  R.  F.,  in  In  Answer  to  Prayer  (1908). 

James,  J.  G.,  The  Prayer  Life. 

James,  W.,  The  Varieties  of  Religious  Experience  (1902). 

Keenleyside,  C.  B.,  God's  Fellow-Workers  (1911). 

Little,  W.  J.  K.,  in  In  Answer  to  Prayer  (1908). 

Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

Murray,  A.,  With  Christ  in  the  School  of  Prayer  (1899). 

Purves,  D.,  Walking  with  God  (1912). 

Roberts,  J.  E.,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions  (1908). 

Saphir,  A.,  The  Hidden  Life  (1877). 

Streeter,  B.  H.,  Restatement  and  Reunion  (1914). 

Warschauer,  J.,  Problems  of  Immanence  (1909). 

Waterhouse,  E.  S.,  The  Psychology  of  the  Christian  Life  (1913). 

Christian  World  Pulpit,  Ixxxiv.  (1913)  9  (G.  H.  S.  Walpole). 


350 


Answers  to  Prayer. 

On  a  thoughtful  comparison  of  what  we  mostly  find  in  books 
or  sermons  on  prayer  with  the  teaching  of  Christ,  we  shall  find 
one  great  difference :  the  importance  assigned  to  the  answer  to 
prayer  is  by  no  means  the  same.  In  the  former  we  find  a  great 
deal  on  the  blessing  of  prayer  as  a  spiritual  exercise  even  if  there 
be  no  answer,  and  on  the  reasons  why  we  should  be  content 
without  it.  God's  fellowship  ought  to  be  more  to  us  than  the 
gift  we  ask  ;  God's  wisdom  alone  knows  what  is  best ;  God  may 
bestow  something  better  than  what  He  withholds.  This  teaching 
is  of  course  quite  true,  yet  it  is  remarkable  that  we  find  nothing 
of  it  with  our  Lord.  The  more  carefully  we  gather  together 
all  He  spoke  on  prayer,  the  clearer  it  becomes  that  He  wished 
us  to  think  of  prayer  simply  as  the  means  to  an  end,  and  that 
the  answer  was  to  be  the  proof  that  we  and  our  prayer  are 
acceptable  to  the  Father  in  heaven.  It  is  not  that  Christ  would 
have  us  count  the  gifts  of  higher  value  than  the  fellowship  and 
favour  of  the  Father.  By  no  means.  But  the  Father  means  the 
answer  to  be  the  token  of  His  favour  and  of  the  reality  of  our 
fellowship  with  Him. 

IT  A  life  marked  by  daily  answer  to  prayer  is  the  proof  of 
our  spiritual  maturity  ;  that  we  have  indeed  attained  to  the  true 
abiding  in  Christ ;  that  our  will  is  truly  at  one  with  God's  will ; 
that  our  faith  has  grown  strong  to  see  and  take  what  God  has 
prepared  for  us  ;  that  the  name  of  Christ  and  His  nature  have 
taken  full  possession  of  us ;  and  that  we  have  been  found  fit  to 
take  a  place  among  those  whom  God  admits  to  His  counsels,  and 
according  to  whose  prayer  He  rules  the  world.  These  are  they 
in  whom  something  of  man's  original  dignity  has  been  restored, 
in  whom,  as  they  abide  in  Christ,  His  power  as  the  all-prevailing 
Intercessor  can  manifest  itself,  in  whom  the  glory  of  His  name 
is  shown  forth.     Prayer  is   very   blessed;  the  answer  is  more 

351 


352    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

blessed  still,  as  the  response  from  the  Father  that  our  prayer, 
our  faith,  our  will  are  indeed  as  He  would  wish  them  to  be.^ 

I. 

Expect  Answers. 

1.  The  first  thing,  then,  to  notice  in  dealing  with  the  difficult 
and  much  discussed  matter  of  "  answers  to  prayer  "  is  that  we  are 
distinctly  told  by  our  Lord  to  expect  that  our  prayers  will  be 
answered.  At  the  very  outset  of  His  instruction  to  those  who 
would  learn  to  pray  He  seeks  to  lodge  this  truth  deep  into  their 
hearts  :  prayer  does  avail  much  ;  ask,  and  ye  shall  receive ;  every 
one  that  asketh,  receiveth.  Christ  has  no  mightier  stimulus  to 
persevering  prayer  in  His  school  than  this.  As  a  child  has  to 
prove  a  sum  to  be  correct,  so  the  proof  that  we  have  prayed 
aright  is  the  answer. 

According  to  this  teaching  of  the  Master,  prayer  consists  of 
two  parts,  has  two  sides,  a  human  and  a  Divine.  The  human  is 
the  asking,  the  Divine  is  the  giving.  Or,  to  look  at  both  from 
the  human  side,  there  is  the  asking  and  the  receiving — the  two 
halves  that  make  up  a  whole.  It  is  as  if  He  would  tell  us  that  we 
are  not  to  rest  without  an  answer,  because  that  is  the  will  of  God, 
the  rule  in  the  Father's  family  :  every  childlike  believing  petition 
is  granted.  If  no  answer  comes,  we  are  not  to  sit  down  in  the 
sloth  that  calls  itself  resignation,  and  suppose  that  it  is  not  God's 
will  to  give  an  answer.  No ;  there  must  be  something  in  the 
prayer  that  is  not  as  God  would  have  it ;  childlike  and  believing, 
we  must  seek  for  grace  to  pray  so  that  the  answer  may  come. 
It  is  far  easier  to  the  flesh  to  submit  without  the  answer  than  to 
yield  itself  to  be  searched  and  purified  by  the  Spirit  until  it  has 
learnt  to  pray  the  prayer  of  faith. 

There  may  be  cases  in  which  the  answer  is  a  refusal,  because 
the  request  is  not  according  to  God's  word,  as  when  Moses  asked 
to  enter  Canaan.  But  still,  there  was  an  answer  :  God  did  not 
leave  His  servant  in  uncertainty  as  to  His  will.  The  gods  of  the 
heathen  are  dumb  and  cannot  speak.  Our  Father  lets  His  child 
know  when  He  cannot  give  him  what  he  asks,  and  he  withdraws 
his  petition,  even  as  the  Son  did  in  Gethsemane.     Both  Moses  the 

*  Andrew  Murray,  With  Christ  in  the  School  of  Prayer,  168. 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  353 

servant  and  Christ  the  Son  knew  that  what  they  asked  was  not 
according  to  what  the  Lord  had  spoken  :  their  prayer  was  the 
humble  supplication  whether  it  was  not  possible  for  the  decision 
to  be  changed.  God  will,  by  His  Word  and  Spirit,  teach  those 
who  are  teachable  and  give  Him  time,  whether  their  request  be 
according  to  His  will  or  not.  Let  us  withdraw  the  request,  if  it 
be  not  according  to  God's  mind,  or  persevere  till  the  answer  come. 
Prayer  is  appointed  to  obtain  the  answer.  It  is  in  prayer  and  its 
answer  that  the  interchange  of  love  between  the  Father  and  His 
child  takes  place. 

The  most  remarkable  thing  about  Christ's  words  on  prayer  is 
that  there  is  not  a  syllable  in  them  as  to  the  philosophy  of  prayer, 
or  difficulties  about  prayer,  but  simply  a  word  of  promise  on 
which  He  causes  us  to  hope ;  a  threefold  call  to  prayer,  and  a 
threefold  promise  that  our  prayer  shall  be  heard.  If  we  take 
Christ  for  what  He  gave  Himself  out  to  be,  we  must  believe  that 
He  could  have  lifted  out  of  the  way  the  stumbling-blocks  that 
seem  to  lie  between  us  and  the  mercy-seat.  He  could  have 
explained  how  prayer  is  related  to  the  decrees  of  God,  and  to  the 
laws  of  the  universe.  He  does  nothing  of  the  kind.  He  simply 
asks  us  to  take  His  word  for  it.  And  He  had  a  right  to  take 
this  way  of  it,  because,  according  to  the  belief  of  the  Church  of 
Christ  in  every  age.  He  came  from  God.  We  pray  to  God  as 
children  to  a  Father,  because  of  Christ's  word  of  promise  on 
which  He  hath  caused  us  to  hope. 

He  answered  all  my  prayer  abundantly, 
And  crowned  the  work  that  to  His  feet  I  brought 
With  blessing  more  than  I  had  asked  or  thought — 
A  blessing  undisguised,  and  fair  and  free. 

I  stood  amazed  and  whispered,  "  Can  it  be 
That  He  hath  granted  all  the  boon  I  sought  ? 
How  wonderful  that  He  for  me  hath  wrought ! 
How  wonderful  that  He  hath  answered  me  ! " 

Oh,  faithless  heart !  He  said  that  He  would  hear 
And  answer  thy  poor  prayer,  and  He  hath  heard 
And  proved  His  promise.     Wherefore  didst  thou  fear  ? 
Why  marvel  that  thy  Lord  hath  kept  His  word  ? 
More  wonderful  if  He  should  fail  to  bless 
Expectant  faith  and  prayer  with  good  success  ! 

23 


354    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IT  If  anyone  should  question  whether  Christ  meant  His  great 
prayer-command  to  be  believed  and  acted  upon,  let  him  read  the 
life  of  Pastor  Gossner.  He  read  the  Lord's  promise :  "  Ask, 
and  it  shall  be  given  you,"  and  then  he  went  off  and  asked. 
More  than  that,  he  expected  and  prepared  for  replies.  As  a 
result,  he  sent  into  the  foreign  fields  upwards  of  one  hundred 
and  forty  missionaries.  He  provided  outfits  and  passage-money. 
An  average  of  over  twenty  missionaries  were  dependent  upon 
him  at  all  times.  The  net  outcome  of  this  man's  life  was  summed 
up  at  his  funeral  in  a  sentence  thus :  "  He  prayed  up  the  walls 
of  a  hospital,  and  the  hearts  of  the  nurses ;  he  prayed  mission 
stations  into  being,  and  missionaries  into  faith ;  he  prayed  open 
the  hearts  of  the  rich,  and  gold  from  the  most  distant  lands  "} 

2.  In  agreement  with  this  are  the  answers  to  prayer  recorded 
in  the  Bible.  They  are  to  be  measured  in  value  not  by  the  peace 
and  tranquillity  which  flowed  through  the  hearts  of  those  who 
prayed,  but  by  real  answers  seen  in  sensible  results.  The  torrents 
which  swept  over  the  altars  on  Carmel,  and  threatened  to  stay 
the  royal  chariot's  course,  were  no  mere  subjective  conceptions  in 
the  prophet's  or  the  monarch's  mind.  The  widow  of  Zarephath 
and  the  Shunammite  saw  and  clasped  in  their  arms  their  sons 
given  back  from  the  grave  in  answer  to  prayer.  The  lengthening 
of  Hezekiah's  life  and  the  victory  of  Jehoshaphat  were  real  and 
intelligible  blessings  which  followed  prayer.  Everywhere  the 
primary  idea  that  prayer  is  the  asking  for  something  which  we 
hope  to  obtain  is,  to  say  the  least,  pointedly  maintained  in  all 
Scripture  representations  ;  and  though  the  notion  of  the  spiritual 
elevation  which  is  wrought  in  the  soul  by  praying  is  neither 
denied  nor  forgotten,  yet  nowhere  is  it  put  forward  as  a  substi- 
tute— 

To  palter  with  us  in  a  double  sense  : 
To  keep  the  word  of  promise  to  our  ear, 
And  break  it  to  our  hope.^ 

IT  A  good  story  is  told  of  Bishop  Pelham,  of  Norwich.  A 
rather  forward  young  man,  who  was  by  no  means  indisposed  to 
thrust  himself  into  distinguished  society  when  a  chance  occurred, 
happened  to  see  the  Bishop  enter  a  first-class  compartment  in  a 

^  C.  B.  Keenleyside,  Ood's  Fellow-Workers,  151. 
*  W.  Boyd  Carpenter,  Thoughts  in  Prayer,  54. 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  355 

train  by  which  he  was  himself  intending  to  travel.  On  learning 
from  the  station-master  that  it  was  the  Bishop  of  Norwich,  he 
promptly  took  his  seat  opposite  to  him,  and  contrived  to  induce 
the  good  Bishop  to  lay  aside  the  book  he  was  reading  and  enter 
into  conversation  with  him.  It  was  not  long  before  they  found 
themselves  discussing  the  wonderful  developments  of  science  in 
recent  years,  and  the  revolution  they  have  wrought  in  the  habits 
of  modern  society.  "  Yes,"  said  the  Bishop,  **  it's  all  very  marvel- 
lous, and  it  is  not  easy  to  say  which  of  all  our  modern  inventions 
is  the  most  amazing.  I  was  present  at  a  meeting  of  scientific 
men  only  the  other  day  at  which  a  discussion  arose  as  to  which 
of  all  our  modern  discoveries  and  inventions  was  in  itself  the 
most  wonderful  or  likely  to  prove  of  most  service  to  civilization. 
Much  was  said  about  the  triumphs  of  steam  by  land  and  sea,  but 
one  prominent  scientist,  himself  an  enthusiastic  electrician,  stoutly 
maintained  that  nothing  else  could  compare  with  the  wonders  of 
electricity.  *  Just  think  of  the  marvel  of  it ! '  he  exclaimed. 
'  Here  you  belt  the  world  round  with  a  wire,  and  you  send  your 
message  off  to  the  right,  and  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye  you  get 
it  back  on  your  left,  it  having  travelled  the  wide  world  round  in 
the  meanwhile.  Can  you  conceive  anything  more  astonishing 
than  that  ? ' 

"  It  was  to  an  elderly  clergyman,  who  happened  to  be  of  the 
company,  that  he  thus  appealed,  and  he  replied :  '  Yes,  I  can 
think  of  something  even  more  amazing  than  that,  and  I  was  read- 
ing about  it  in  a  very  old  book  only  this  morning '.  '  What  !  in 
an  old  book  ?  You  surprise  me  ;  I  should  never  have  suspected 
an  old  book  of  being  able  to  describe  anything  that  could  for  a 
moment  be  compared  to  the  wonder  of  electricity.  Whatever  was 
it  ? '  '  Well,'  said  the  clergyman,  *  you  shall  judge  for  yourself. 
Here  are  the  words  in  which  this  wonder,  greater  even  than 
that  of  electricity,  is  described  :  "  In  the  day  when  I  cried  thou 
answeredst  me,  and  strengthenedst  me  with  strength  in  my  soul ". 
Now,  here  we  have,  first,  a  message  sent  all  the  way  from  earth 
to  heaven,  however  far  that  may  be,  and  the  very  same  day  the 
answer  arrives.  But  more  than  that,  here  you  have  the  practical 
effect  that  had  been  desired  actually  produced,  a  thing  that 
electricity  can  never  accomplish.  You  can  send  your  message 
across  the  Atlantic,  if  you  please,  but  there  the  matter  ends ;  and 
if  you  want  to  get  something  practical  done,  you  must  trust  to 
something  else  besides  electricity  to  accomplish  it.  But  here  you 
have  the  message  sent,  the  answer  returned,  and  the  practical 
result  desired  induced,  and  all  in  one  day.  That  leaves  even 
electricity  a  long  way  behind,  doesn't  it  ? '  " 


356    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

"  And  you,  my  lord,"  exclaimed  the  irrepressible  tuft-hunter — 
"  you  were  that  elderly  clergyman  ! "  Whereupon,  with  a  demure 
smile,  the  Bishop  resumed  the  perusal  of  his  book.^ 

II. 

Answers  do  Come. 

1.  So  the  next  thing  is  that  answers  to  prayer  do  undoubtedly 
come.  Answers  of  a  most  striking  and  impressive  kind  to  inter- 
cessory prayer  are  of  frequent  occurrence,  and  constitute  one  of 
the  most  interesting  features  of  mission  work.  This  is  especially 
the  case  where  God  seems  to  lay  the  burden  of  particular  souls 
upon  the  hearts  of  some  of  His  praying  people.  If  we  are  living 
in  full  contact  with  and  completely  under  the  influence  of  the 
Holy  Spirit,  it  is  only  reasonable  to  suppose  that  He  will 
guide  us  in  this  important  matter.  He  not  only  knows  the  things 
of  God,  but  He  must  needs  be  able  also  to  read  the  hearts  of  men, 
and  to  discover  the  spiritual  condition  of  each.  When,  therefore, 
He  sees  that  certain  persons  are  in  a  receptive  condition,  inasmuch 
as  He  ever  desires  the  co-operation  of  His  people  in  His  work  of 
mercy,  it  would  appear  that  He  moves  the  hearts  of  those  who 
know  the  power  of  prayer  to  pray  for  those  particular  persons. 
Having  thus  inspired  the  prayer.  He  can  give  an  answer  in  ac- 
cordance with  His  own  desire,  and  also  in  accordance  with  the 
great  law  of  prayer  which  He  has  ordained,  and  that  without 
any  inconsistency  with  those  great  principles  of  the  moral  govern- 
ment of  the  world  which  are  the  foundation  of  all  God's  dealings 
with  man. 

IF  I  will  dare  to  affirm  that,  so  far  from  experiences  of  direct 
answers  to  prayer  being  rare  and  exceptional,  it  is,  on  the  con- 
trary, a  rare  thing  to  meet  with  a  matured  and  experienced 
Christian  who  is  unable  to  refer  to  certain  incidents  in  his  career 
in  which,  according  to  the  best  of  his  belief,  definite  answers  were 
granted,  and  that,  against  apparent  probability,  to  prayers  for 
temporal  benefits.^ 

IT  We  make  the  experiment,  or  rather,  the  experiment  has 
been  made  by  vast  numbers  of  people  in  dififerent  ages,  and  be- 

^  Canon  Hay  Aitken,  The  Divir^  Ordinance  of  Prayer,  31, 
^  Ibid.,  1S5, 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  357 

lief  in  its  value  and  efficacy  has  been  substantiated  by  the  fact 
that  prayer  has  worked.  Men  have  asked,  and  they  have  re- 
ceived.    That  is  as  certain  as  the  multiplication  table. ^ 

2.  It  will  be  said  that  such  conclusions  are  often  very  un- 
critical, and  that,  no  doubt,  many  of  these  supposed  answers  can 
be  explained  in  other  ways ;  but,  while  it  is  freely  admitted  that 
this  may  be  so  in  a  large  number  of  cases,  it  is  equally  clear  that 
there  remains  a  very  considerable  proportion  of  instances  of  which 
no  such  statement  would  be  true,  and  in  not  a  few  of  them  our 
choice  would  have  to  lie  between  admitting  that  prayer  had  been 
answered  and  affirming  that  an  extraordinary  coincidence,  or 
series  of  coincidences,  had  occurred.  Surely  common  honesty 
demands  that  we  should  consider  with  an  unbiased  mind  the 
comparative  reasonableness  of  these  alternative  hypotheses. 

IF  It  must  excite  the  attention  of  every  thoughtful  person, 
that  the  belief,  God  hears  prayer,  is  found  among  all  nations  who 
have  a  knowledge  of  Deity,  and  is  fundamentally  peculiar  to  the 
whole  human  race.  There  must  be  a  greater  number  of  experi- 
ences of  answers  to  prayer  than  is  generally  supposed,  else  the 
belief  in  the  utility  of  prayer  would  not  be  so  general,  vivid,  and 
prevalent.2 

IF  As  a  matter  of  fact,  whether  it  is  because  when  we  pray  for 
others  we  are  less  blind  to  their  real  and  highest  needs  than  we 
are  when  we  pray  for  ourselves,  or  whether  it  is  because  such 
prayers,  being  more  disinterested,  are  more  truly  prayers  "  in  His 
name,"  it  is  the  experience  of  many  with  whom  I  have  spoken 
on  this  subject  that  such  prayers  are  answered  too  often  and  in 
too  striking  a  way  to  make  the  hypothesis  of  coincidence  at  all  a 
possible  explanation.^ 

III. 

Special  Providence& 

1.  Here,  however,  we  are  introduced  to  the  question  of 
"special  providences,"  one  of  the  most  perplexing  questions  in 
theology  or  in  life.  The  convergent  testimony  in  favour  of  the 
answer  to  prayer  is  so  impressive  that  he  would  be  a  hardy  man 

1  George  Henry  Russell  Garcia,  202.  2  ^^  h,  Reinhard. 

B.  H.  Streeter,  Restatement  and  Reunion,  27. 


358    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

who  should  question  it,  were  it  not  for  the  presence  of  what 
seems  particularly  strong  negative  evidence  which,  he  may- 
plead,  abundantly  justifies  him  in  adopting  an  attitude  of  incredu- 
lity. The  power  of  prayer  and  the  reality  of  the  answers  that 
it  is  supposed  to  gain  are  questioned,  not  because  there  is  so  little 
to  be  said  for,  but  rather  because  there  is  so  much  to  be  said 
against,  them.  We  are  familiar  with  the  old  story  of  the  cynical 
visitor  to  the  temple  of  Neptune,  who,  when  the  priest  triumph- 
antly exhibited,  to  the  glory  of  his  god,  the  votive  tablets  of  those 
who  had  been  saved  from  a  watery  grave  by  him  in  response  to 
their  vow,  grimly  inquired  where  were  the  tablets  of  those  who 
had  made  their  vow,  and  yet  had  been  drowned  none  the  less. 

2.  The  argument  against  *'  special  providences  "  is  felt  strongly 
in  our  day,  for  various  reasons.  It  is  expressed  forcibly  by  Dr. 
Warschauer :  While  the  scientific  temper  of  the  present  day  could 
not  fail  to  affect  our  thoughts  concerning  prayer  in  some  directions, 
the  same  has  surely  to  be  said  about  the  ethical  temper  of  the 
age,  as  shown  in  our  enlarged  conceptions  of  God.  To  put  it 
bluntly,  much  of  the  language  about  what  used  to  be  called 
"special  providences"  has  become  unreal  and  ceased  to  be  edify- 
ing for  us.  On  this  whole  subject  some  words  of  Principal 
Adeney's  can  hardly  be  bettered : — 

*' Under  the  old  theory  God  had  His  favourites,  who  were 
saved  by  their  hairbreadth  escapes  in  accidents  that  were  fatal  to 
persons  who  were  not  the  objects  of  '  special  providences ' ;  this 
was  supposed  to  account  for  the  fact  that  one  man  in  particular 
found  that  somebody  else  had  taken  the  last  berth  in  the  ship  he 
had  meant  to  sail  by,  and  so  escaped  the  fate  of  the  crew  and 
passengers  when  it  went  down  with  all  on  board — no  'special 
providence '  saving  them.  It  looks  like  a  reflection  of  the  pagan 
mythological  tales  about  heroes  rescued  by  the  timely  interfer- 
ence of  gods  and  goddesses  in  battles  where  thousands  of  common 
mortals  perish  unheeded.  It  is  the  aristocratic  idea  of  privilege 
carried  up  to  religion.  The  newer  view  is  more  democratic,  and 
it  seems  to  agree  better  with  our  Lord's  assurance  that  not  a 
sparrow  falls  to  the  ground  without  our  Father's  notice,  that  the 
very  hairs  of  our  heads  are  all  numbered." 

All  this  has  its  direct  bearing  upon  the  subject  of  prayer. 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  359 

We  may  still  be  occasionally  regaled  with  stories  of  one  solitary 
sailor  being  saved — Providence  looking  after  him  in  response  to 
his  mothers  petitions — while  every  other  soul  on  board  was 
drowned  ;  but  these  narratives,  once  irresistible  in  the  impression 
they  created,  are  to-day  received  with  somewhat  mixed  feelings. 
The  view  of  God's  character  which  they  inculcate  is  apt  to  strike 
us  as  unsatisfactory ;  that  He  should  avert  a  great  and  presumedly 
unmerited  physical  calamity  from  one  individual  simply  and 
solely  because  He  has  been  asked  to  do  so  by  some  other  indivi- 
dual, while  allowing  the  same  calamity  to  overtake  numerous  others 
no  more  deserving  of  affliction,  does  not  fit  in  with  om-  conception 
of  Him.  We  are  slowly  learning  to  substitute  for  the  notion  of 
any  kind  of  preferential  treatment  at  the  hand  of  God  a  belief 
in  the  unchanging  goodness  of  His  decrees,  in  the  wisdom  of  His 
counsel,  and  in  the  reality  of  His  abiding  and  enfolding  love ;  by 
Providence  we  mean  something  that  is  neither  local  nor  personal, 
nor  particular,  but  universal — the  Providence  of  unchanging  law, 
that  living  and  loving  will  which  "  knoweth  altogether ''} 

The  most  familiar,  perhaps,  of  all  cases  of  answers  to  prayer 
involving  such  special  providences  is  that  of  George  Miiller. 
Prof.  William  James  quotes  Miiller  s  experience  as  related  in  his 
autobiography,  and  then  subjects  it  to  the  following  criticism : 
"  George  Miiller's  is  a  case  extreme  in  every  respect,  and  in  no 
respect  more  so  than  in  the  extraordinary  narrowness  of  the  man's 
intellectual  horizon.  His  God  was,  as  he  often  said,  his  business 
partner.  He  seems  to  have  been  for  Miiller  little  more  than  a 
sort  of  supernatural  clergyman  interested  in  the  congregation  of 
tradesmen  and  others  in  Bristol  who  were  his  saints,  and  in  the 
orphanages  and  other  enterprises,  but  unpossessed  of  any  of  those 
vaster  and  wider  and  more  ideal  attributes  with  which  the  human 
imagination  elsewhere  has  invested  him.  Miiller,  in  short,  was 
absolutely  unphilosophical.  His  intensely  private  and  practical 
conception  of  his  relations  with  the  Deity  continued  the  tradi- 
tions of  the  most  primitive  human  thought.  When  we  compare 
a  mind  like  his  with  such  a  mind  as,  for  example,  Emerson's  or 
Phillips  Brooks's,  we  see  the  range  which  the  religious  conscious- 
ness covers."  ^ 

^  J.  Warsehauer,  Problems  of  Immanence,  199. 

2  W.  James,  The  Varieties  of  Beligimis  Experiencey  470. 


36o   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  In  one  of  his  letters  the  Quaker  poet  Whittier  says  :  "  I  have 
been  in  the  habit  of  reading  a  paper  published  by  Dr.  Cullis,  of 
Boston.  But  I  don't  place  much  credit  in  the  answers  to  prayer 
there  stated.  He  gets  his  contributions  just  as  many  other 
institutions  do.  Here  is  a  man  who  has  $100  to  give  to  benevol- 
ence, and  he  gives  it,  giving  the  Doctor  S25,  the  missionary 
society  $25,  etc.  Dr.  Cullis  publishes  that  his  came  in  answer 
to  prayer.     So  does  the  other  just  as  much.^ 

IF  The  entire  question  of  miracle  is  involved  with  that  of  the 
special  providences  which  are  supposed,  in  some  theories  of 
religion,  sometimes  to  confound  the  enemies,  and  always  to  protect 
the  darlings  of  God :  and  in  the  minds  of  amiable  persons,  the 
natural  and  very  justifiable  sense  of  their  own  importance  to  the 
well-being  of  the  world  may  often  encourage  the  pleasant  sup- 
position that  the  Deity,  however  improvident  for  others,  will  be 
provident  for  them.  I  recollect  a  paper  on  this  subject  by  Dr. 
Guthrie,  published  not  long  ago  in  some  religious  periodical,  in 
which  the  writer  mentioned,  as  a  strikingly  Providential  circum- 
stance, the  catching  of  his  foot  on  a  ledge  of  rock  which  averted 
what  might  otherwise  have  been  a  fatal  fall.  Under  the  sense 
of  the  loss  to  the  cause  of  religion  and  the  society  of  Edinburgh, 
which  might  have  been  the  consequence  of  the  accident,  it  is 
natural  that  Dr.  Guthrie  should  refer  to  it  with  strongly  excited 
devotional  feelings :  yet,  perhaps,  with  better  reason,  a  junior 
member  of  the  Alpine  Club,  less  secure  of  the  value  of  his  life, 
would  have  been  likely  on  the  same  occasion  rather  to  be  provoked 
by  his  own  awkwardness,  than  impressed  by  the  providential 
structure  of  the  rock.  At  the  root  of  every  error  on  these  subjects 
we  may  trace  either  an  imperfect  conception  of  the  universality  of 
Deity,  or  an  exaggerated  sense  of  individual  importance:  and 
yet  it  is  no  less  certain  that  every  train  of  thought  likely  to  lead 
us  in  a  right  direction  must  be  founded  on  the  acknowledgment 
that  the  personality  of  a  Deity  who  has  commanded  the  doing  of 
Justice  and  the  showing  of  Mercy  can  be  no  otherwise  manifested 
than  in  the  signal  support  of  causes  which  are  just,  and  favour 
of  persons  who  are  kind.  The  beautiful  tradition  of  the  deaths 
of  Cleobis  and  Bito,  indeed,  expresses  the  sense  proper  to  the 
wisest  men,  that  we  are  unable  either  to  discern  or  decide  for 
ourselves  in  what  the  favour  of  God  consists  :  but  the  promises 
of  the  Christian  religion  imply  that  its  true  disciples  will  be 
enabled  to  ask  with  prudence  what  is  to  be  infallibly  granted.^ 

1  S.  T.  Pickard,  Life  and  LetUfs  of  J.  O.  Whittier,  ii.  632. 
«Ru8kin,  On  the  Old  Road  {Works,  xxxiv.  119). 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  361 

3.  It  must  be  frankly  conceded  that,  with  our  present  very 
limited  knowledge,  we  are  not  in  a  position  to  give  an  adequate 
or  a  wholly  satisfactory  answer  to  this  argument.  All  that  we 
can  hope  to  do  is  to  prove  that  the  argument  does  not  really 
carry  as  much  weight  as  at  first  it  seems  to  do.  We  may  show 
that  in  a  very  large  number  of  cases  the  phenomena  simply  could 
not  be  otherwise  than  they  are;  that  in  a  vast  majority  of  such 
cases  the  explanation  is  plain  and  obvious,  and  that,  while  in 
some  cases  we  may  have  to  wait  for  an  explanation  till  all  the 
mysteries  are  cleared  up,  we  may  find  in  other  cases  sufficient 
light  to  suggest  inferences  of  an  explanatory  character,  where 
direct  knowledge  and  information  fail  us.  Alleged  answers  to 
prayer  should  in  any  case  be  carefully  scrutinized  before  being 
allowed,  and  carefully  interpreted  when  allowed.  There  is  in 
popular  thought  considerable  ignorance  on  this  point,  which  often 
leads  to  religious  scandal.  There  is  in  religious  experience  so 
much  of  what  from  the  popular  standpoint  must  be  viewed  as 
unanswered  prayer,  and  that  on  the  part  of  the  best  and  holiest, 
that  we  cannot  be  too  careful  in  our  interpretation.  It  is  well 
known  what  crude  and  irreverent  interpretations  of  God's  pro- 
vidential government  are  often  given  by  the  ignorant  and  un- 
spiritually-minded ;  and  the  same  thing  occurs  in  the  matter  of 
prayer.  Some  coincidence  that  fits  into  the  person's  desire  is 
fastened  upon  as  an  answer  to  prayer,  and  not  infrequently 
spiritual  pride  and  Pharisaism  result. 

U  It  has  sometimes  seemed  to  me  that  God  does  not  intend 
the  faith  in  prayer  to  rest  upon  an  induction  of  instances.  The 
answers,  however  explicit,  are  not  of  the  kind  to  bear  down  an 
aggressive  criticism.  Your  Christian  lives  a  life  which  is  an 
unbroken  chain  of  prayers  offered  and  prayers  answered ;  from 
his  inward  view  the  demonstration  is  overwhelming.  But  do 
you  ask  for  the  evidences,  and  do  you  propose  to  begin  to  pray 
if  the  facts  are  convincing,  and  to  refuse  the  practice  if  they  are 
not  ?  Then  you  may  find  the  evidences  evanescent  as  an  evening 
cloud,  and  the  facts  all  susceptible  of  a  simple  rationalistic  ex- 
planation. **  Prayer,"  says  an  old  Jewish  mystic,  "  is  the  moment 
when  heaven  and  earth  kiss  each  other."  It  is  futile  as  well  as 
indelicate  to  disturb  that  rapturous  meeting ;  and  nothing  can 
be  brought  away  from  such  an  intrusion,  nothing  of  any  value 
except  the  resolve  to  make  trial  for  oneself  of  the  "  mystic  sweet 
communion  ". 


362    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

I  confess,  therefore,  that  I  read  examples  of  answers  to  prayer 
without  any  great  interest,  and  refer  to  those  I  have  experienced 
myself  with  the  utmost  diffidence.  Nay,  I  say  frankly  before- 
hand, "  If  you  are  concerned  to  disprove  my  statement,  and  to 
show  that  what  I  take  for  the  hand  of  God  is  merely  the  cold 
operation  of  natural  law,  I  shall  only  smile.  My  own  conviction 
will  be  unchanged.  I  do  not  make  that  great  distinction  between 
the  hand  of  God  and  natural  law,  and  I  have  no  wish  to  induce 
you  to  pray  by  an  accumulation  of  facts — to  commend  to  you 
the  mighty  secret  by  showing  that  it  would  be  profitable  to  you, 
a  kind  of  Aladdin's  lamp  for  fulfilling  wayward  desires." 
Natural  law,  the  hand  of  God  !  Yes  !  I  unquestionably  admit 
that  the  answers  to  prayer  come  generally  along  lines  which  we 
recognize  as  natural  law,  and  would  perhaps  always  be  found 
along  those  lines  if  our  knowledge  of  natural  law  were  complete. 
Prayer  is  to  me  the  quick  and  instant  recognition  that  all  law  is 
God's  will,  and  all  nature  is  in  God's  hand,  and  that  all  our 
welfare  lies  in  linking  ourselves  with  His  will  and  placing  our- 
selves in  His  hand  through  all  the  operations  of  the  world  and 
life  and  time.^ 


IV. 

Some  Examples. 

i.  Petition. 

1.  Dr.  A.  T.  Schofield  states  that  he  was  yachting  on  the 
Zuyder  Zee  with  a  party  of  twelve,  and  it  was  highly  important 
that  they  should  reach  Enkhuizen  in  time  to  catch  the  mail  train. 
Starting  as  they  thought  with  plenty  of  time,  they  were  dismayed 
by  the  captain's  report  that  there  was  not  the  slightest  chance  of 
catching  the  train,  as  the  wind  was  contrary  and  a  heavy  storm 
had  arisen.  Dr.  Schofield  offered  up  a  short  and  earnest  prayer 
in  his  cabin,  that  if  it  were  God's  will  they  might  still  catch  the 
train,  as  it  was  very  important  that  they  should  get  back  to 
London  at  once.  Hardly  was  the  prayer  finished  when  his 
nephew  shouted  out,  "  The  captain  says  we  shall  be  in  Enkhuizen 
in  half  an  hour  ".  The  doctor  replied,  "  It  cannot  be.  He  told 
me  he  could  not  tell  when  we  should  be  in,  that  it  might  be  two 
or  seven  hours."     In  less  than  five  minutes  after  the  prayer  was 

1 R.  F.  Horton. 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  363 

ofiered,  the  wind  changed  right  round  and  blew  direct  for  the 
harbour,  consequently  they  were  in  with  a  margin  of  time  to 
spare.  Dr.  Schofield  says  that  he  has  some  hesitation  in  mention- 
ing this  case,  because  he  anticipates  the  immediate  rejoinder  that 
it  might  happen  by  chance,  or  it  was  a  mere  coincidence.^ 

2.  One  definite  answer  to  prayer  was  a  great  encouragement 
to  the  faith  of  Hudson  Taylor.  They  had  just  come  through  the 
Dampier  Strait  but  were  not  yet  out  of  sight  of  the  islands. 
Usually  a  breeze  would  spring  up  after  sunset  and  last  until 
about  dawn.  The  utmost  use  was  made  of  it,  but  during  the  day 
they  lay  still  with  flapping  sails,  often  drifting  back  and  losing  a 
good  deal  of  the  advantage  gained  at  night.  The  incident  is  re- 
lated thus : — 

"  This  happened  notably  on  one  occasion  when  we  were  in 
dangerous  proximity  to  the  north  of  New  Guinea.  Saturday 
night  had  brought  us  to  a  point  some  thirty  miles  off  the  land, 
and  during  the  Sunday  morning  service  which  was  held  on  deck 
I  could  not  fail  to  see  that  the  captain  looked  troubled  and  fre- 
quently went  over  to  the  side  of  the  ship.  When  the  service 
was  ended  I  learnt  from  him  the  cause  :  a  four-knot  current  was 
carrying  us  towards  some  sunken  reefs,  and  we  were  already  so 
near  that  it  seemed  improbable  that  we  should  get  through  the 
afternoon  in  safety.  After  dinner  the  long-boat  was  put  out  and 
all  hands  endeavoured,  without  success,  to  turn  the  ship's  head 
from  the  shore. 

After  standing  together  on  the  deck  for  some  time  in  silence, 
the  captain  said  to  me  : — 

'  Well,  we  have  done  everything  that  can  be  done.  We  can 
only  await  the  result.' 

A  thought  occurred  to  me,  and  I  replied : — 

*  No,  there  is  one  thing  we  have  not  done  yet.' 

*  What  is  that  ?  '  he  queried. 

*  Four  of  us  on  board  are  Christians.  Let  us  each  retire  to 
his  own  cabin,  and  in  agreed  prayer  ask  the  Lord  to  give  us  im- 
mediately a  breeze.     He  can  as  easily  send  it  now  as  at  sunset.* 

The  captain  complied  with  this  proposal.  I  went  and  spoke 
to  the  other  two  men,  and  after  prayer  with  the  carpenter  we  all 

^  Studies  in  the  Highest  Thought,  48. 


364  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

four  retired  to  wait  upon  God.  I  had  a  good  but  very  brief 
season  in  prayer,  and  then  felt  so  satisfied  that  our  request  was 
granted  that  I  could  not  continue  asking,  and  very  soon  went  up 
again  on  deck.  The  first  officer,  a  godless  man,  was  in  charge. 
I  went  over  and  asked  him  to  let  down  the  clews  or  corners  of  the 
mainsail,  which  had  been  drawn  up  in  order  to  lessen  the  useless 
flapping  of  the  sail  against  the  rigging. 

'  What  would  be  the  good  of  that  ? '  he  answered  roughly. 

I  told  him  we  had  been  asking  a  wind  from  God  ;  that  it  was 
coming  immediately ;  and  we  were  so  near  the  reef  by  this  time 
that  there  was  not  a  minute  to  lose. 

With  an  oath  and  a  look  of  contempt,  he  said  he  would  rather 
see  a  wind  than  hear  of  it. 

But  while  he  was  speaking  I  watched  his  eye,  following  it  up 
to  the  royal,  and  there  sure  enough  the  corner  of  the  topmost 
sail  was  beginning  to  tremble  in  the  breeze. 

'  Don't  you  see  the  wind  is  coming  ?  Look  at  the  royal ! ' 
I  exclaimed. 

'No,  it  is  only  a  cat's  paw/  he  rejoined  (a  mere  pufF  of 
wind) . 

*  Cat's  paw  or  not,'  I  cried,  '  pray  let  down  the  mainsail  and 
give  us  the  benefit.' 

This  he  was  not  slow  to  do.  In  another  minute  the  heavy 
tread  of  the  men  on  deck  brought  up  the  captain  from  his  cabin 
to  see  what  was  the  matter.  The  breeze  had  indeed  come  !  In 
a  few  minutes  we  were  ploughing  our  way  at  six  or  seven  knots 
an  hour  through  the  water  .  .  .  and  though  the  wind  was  some- 
times unsteady  we  did  not  altogether  lose  it  until  after  passing 
the  Pelew  Islands. 

Thus  God  encouraged  me  ere  landing  on  China's  shores  to 
bring  every  variety  of  need  to  Him  in  prayer,  and  to  expect  that 
He  would  honour  the  name  of  the  Lord  Jesus  and  give  the  help 
each  emergency  required."  ^ 

3.  Once  when  a  sudden  and  terrible  hailstorm  was  pouring 
down  upon  the  fields,  and  likely  to  occasion  serious  damage,  a 
person  rushed  into  Bengel's  room,  and  exclaimed  :  '*  Alas,  sir, 
everything  will  be  destroyed  ;  we  shall  lose  all !  "     Bengel  went 

^Hudson  Taylor  in  Early  Years,  196. 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  365 

composedly  to  the  window,  opened  it,  lifted  up  his  hands  to 
heaven,  and  said,  "  Father,  restrain  it  "  ;  and  the  tempest  actually 
abated  from  that  moment.^ 

4.  One  day,  about  this  time,  I  heard  an  unusual  bleating 
amongst  my  few  remaining  goats,  as  if  they  were  being  killed  or 
tortured,  I  rushed  to  the  goat-house,  and  found  myself  instantly 
surrounded  by  a  band  of  armed  men.  The  snare  had  caught  me, 
their  weapons  were  raised,  and  I  expected  next  instant  to  die. 
But  God  moved  me  to  talk  to  them  firmly  and  kindly ;  I  warned 
them  of  their  sin  and  its  punishment ;  I  showed  them  that  only 
my  love  and  pity  led  me  to  remain  there  seeking  their  good,  and 
that  if  they  killed  me  they  killed  their  best  friend.  I  further 
assured  them  that  I  was  not  afraid  to  die,  for  at  death  my  Saviour 
would  take  me  to  be  with  Himself  in  heaven,  and  to  be  far 
happier  than  I  had  ever  been  on  earth ;  and  that  my  only  desire 
to  live  was  to  make  them  all  as  happy,  by  teaching  them  to  love 
and  serve  my  Lord  Jesus.  I  then  lifted  up  my  hands  and  eyes 
to  the  heavens,  and  prayed  aloud  for  Jesus  to  bless  all  my  dear 
Tannese,  and  either  to  protect  me  or  to  take  me  home  to  glory  as 
He  saw  to  be  for  the  best.  One  after  another  they  slipped  away 
from  me,  and  Jesus  restrained  them  once  again.  Did  ever  mother 
run  more  quickly  to  protect  her  crying  child  in  danger's  hour  than 
the  Lord  Jesus  hastens  to  answer  believing  prayer,  and  send  help 
to  His  servants  in  His  own  good  time  and  way,  so  far  as  it  shall 
be  for  His  glory  and  their  good  ?  A  woman  may  forget  her  child, 
yet  will  I  not  forget  thee,  saith  the  Lord.  Oh,  that  all  my  readers 
knew  and  felt  this,  as  in  those  days  and  ever  since  I  have  felt 
that  His  promise  is  a  reality,  and  that  He  is  with  His  servants  to 
support  and  bless  them  even  unto  the  end  of  the  world !  ^ 

5.  A  water  famine  was  threatened  in  Hakodate,  Japan.  Miss 
Dickerson,  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Girls'  School,  saw  the 
water  supply  growing  less  daily,  and  in  one  of  the  fall  months 
appealed  to  the  Board  in  New  York  for  help.  There  was  no 
money  on  hand,  and  nothing  was  done.  Miss  Dickerson  inquired 
the  cost  of  putting  down  an  artesian  well,  but  found  the  expense 

^  D.  M.  Mclntyre,  TJie  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  155. 
?John  G,  Paton :  An  Autobiography,  i.  266. 


366    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

too  great  to  be  undertaken.  On  the  evening  of  31  December, 
when  the  water  was  almost  exhausted,  the  teachers  and  the  older 
pupils  met  to  pray  for  water,  though  they  had  no  idea  how  their 
prayer  was  to  be  answered.  A  couple  of  days  later  a  letter  was 
received  in  the  New  York  office  which  ran  something  like  this  : 
**  Philadelphia,  January  1st.  It  is  six  o'clock  in  the  morning  of 
New  Year's  Day.  All  the  other  members  of  the  family  are  asleep, 
but  I  was  awakened  with  a  strange  impression  that  some  one, 
somewhere,  is  in  need  of  money  which  the  Lord  wants  me  to 
supply."  Enclosed  was  a  cheque  for  an  amount  which  just 
covered  the  cost  of  the  artesian  well  and  the  piping  of  the  water 
into  the  school  buildings.^ 

6.  Some  years  ago  in  London  a  clergyman  had  succeeded, 
with  the  help  of  some  friends,  in  opening  a  "  home  "  in  the 
suburbs  to  meet  some  special  mission  needs.  It  was  necessary  to 
support  it  by  charity.  For  some  time  all  went  well.  The  home 
at  last,  however,  became  even  more  necessary  and  more  filled 
with  inmates,  whilst  subscriptions  did  not  increase  but  rather 
slackened.  The  lady  in  charge  wrote  to  the  clergyman  as  to  her 
needs,  and  especially  drew  his  attention  to  the  fact  that  £40  was 
required  immediately  to  meet  the  pressing  demands  of  a  trades- 
man. The  clergyman  himself  was  excessively  poor,  and  he  knew 
not  to  whom  to  turn  in  the  emergency.  He  at  once  went  and 
spent  an  hour  in  prayer.  He  then  left  his  house  and  walked 
slowly  along  the  streets  thinking  with  himself  how  he  should 
act.  Passing  up  Regent  Street,  a  carriage  drew  up  in  front  of 
Madame  Elise's  shop,  just  as  he  was  passing.  Out  of  the  carriage 
stepped  a  handsomely  dressed  lady.  "  Mr.  So-and-So,  I  think," 
she  said  when  she  saw  him.  "  Yes,  madam,"  he  answered,  raising 
his  hat.  She  drew  an  envelope  from  her  pocket  and  handed  it  to 
him,  saying :  "  You  have  many  calls  upon  your  charity,  you  will 
know  what  to  do  with  that ".  The  envelope  contained  a  Bank 
of  England  note  for  £50.  The  whole  thing  happened  in  a  much 
shorter  time  than  it  can  be  related  ;  he  passed  on  up  the  street, 
she  passed  into  the  shop.  Who  she  was  he  did  not  know,  and 
never  since  has  he  learnt.  The  threatening  creditor  was  paid. 
The  home  received  further  help  and  did  its  work  well.^ 

1 E.  M.  Bounds,  Purpose  in  Prayer ,  129. 

'^  W.  J.  Knox  Little,  in  In  Answer  to  Prayer,  46. 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  367 

7.  An  extraordinary  case  of  sudden  restoration  to  health  from 
the  very  door  of  the  grave  was  reported  in  the  newspapers  of  20 
February,  1912,  and  some  following  days,  especially  in  the  Evening 
News  of  20  February  and  the  Daily  Chronicle  of  21  Febru- 
ary. The  whole  story  may  now  be  read  in  a  small  book  entitled 
The  Living  Touchy  by  Dorothy  Kerin,  which  was  published  in 
the  end  of  1914.  In  this  book  Miss  Kerin  gives  a  sketch  of  her 
life  leading  up  to  the  time  when  her  health  gave  way,  and  then 
describes  fully  her  illness  and   sudden  and  complete  recovery. 

The  doctor  who  attended  her  is  quoted  as  saying  she  had 
suffered  enough  to  kill  half  a  dozen  people.  In  attending  her  he 
said  he  had  found  all  the  gravest  symptoms  of  advanced  tuber- 
culosis, of  diabetes,  and  other  complications.  She  had  been  at- 
tended, under  him,  by  twelve  nurses  up  to  the  present,  and  a 
chart  was  kept  of  her  temperature.  This  chart  shows  that  her 
temperature  rose  and  fell  in  the  most  alarming  way — sometimes 
reaching  as  high  as  105°. 

The  testimony  is  also  quoted  of  Dr.  R.  Julyan  George  of 
Paignton,  who  says:  "Having  attended  Miss  Dorothy  Kerin, 
I  can  testify  to  the  serious  nature  of  her  illnesses,  and  to 
the  fact  that  her  recovery  in  each  case  was  sudden  and  un- 
usual. When  I  was  first  called  in,  on  September  1,  I  found 
her  in  a  semi-conscious  state,  and  was  told  that  she  had  been 
the  victim  of  a  violent  assault.  Examination  showed  fractured 
base  of  the  skull  and  probably  rupture  of  the  drum  of  the 
left  ear,  with  deafness  on  that  side.  Profuse  haemorrhage 
from  nose  and  ear  soon  set  in,  and  her  condition  was  such 
as  to  cause  considerable  anxiety.  On  the  evening  of  Sep- 
tember 11,  I  received  an  urgent  summons,  and  found  the 
patient  with  a  very  high  temperature  and  rapid  pulse.  Soon 
after  my  arrival,  however,  she  went  into  what  appeared  to  be 
a  state  of  ecstasy,  and  when  she  came  to  herself  she  told  us  she 
had  seen  a  vision.  She  said  to  me,  *  Did  you  see  Him  ?  He 
came  and  put  His  hand  on  my  head,  and  I  am  cool,  cool  all 
over  me.  He  promised  to  come  again.'  I  then  took  the  tem- 
perature, and  found  it  had  dropped  in  a  few  minutes  from  104° 
to  99° ;  the  pulse  had  also  fallen  from  162  to  100.  In  spite  of 
this  experience  she  still  remained  in  a  very  serious  condition, 
with   increasing   weakness   and  constant  haemorrhage,  but  less 


368    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

pain  in  the  head.  In  addition,  symptoms  of  acute  appendicitis 
appeared,  and  my  diagnosis  being  confirmed  by  Dr.  C.  Hyde 
Cosens,  arrangements  were  made  for  Miss  Kerin's  removal  to  a 
Nursing  Home,  should  an  operation  be  necessary.  On  September 
30,  when  I  saw  her  early,  she  was  quite  deaf  in  both  ears,  and  I 
was  obliged  to  write  on  a  piece  of  paper,  'It  is  an  attack  af- 
fecting your  hearing.  You  must  remember  His  promise.  He 
will  come  again.'  I  was  afraid  of  further  developments  and 
promised  to  return  shortly.  Returning  two  hours  later,  I  found 
her  fully  dressed,  and  to  all  appearances  perfectly  well.  Again 
she  said  she  had  seen  a  vision  and  had  been  healed." 

There  are  other  testimonies  in  the  book — of  nurses  and  of 
friends — as  well  as  a  minute  account  of  the  illness  and  recovery 
by  Miss  Kerin's  mother. 

This  case  is  the  more  interesting  that  the  prayer  was  silent, 
and  rather  the  expression  of  faith  than  petition  for  recovery. 
After  being  restored  to  health  Miss  Kerin  prayed  very  earnestly 
that  God  would  show  her  what  He  had  brought  her  back  to  do. 
She  says,  "  I  prayed  much  that  God  might  guide  me  and  point 
the  way  of  ministration,  and  it  has  been  shown  me  that  the  gifts 
of  God  can  only  be  received  through  prayer.  We  shall  find 
spiritual  joy,  or  soul-health,  through  communion  with  God,  and 
bodily  health  will  follow  as  growth  follows  rain  and  sunshine." 

ii.  Intercession. 
If  it  were  not  too  delicate  a  subject,  says  Dr.  Horton,  I 
could  recite  instances,  to  me  the  most  remarkable  answers  to 
prayer  in  my  experience,  of  changed  character  and  enlarged 
Christian  life,  resulting  from  definite  intercession.  It  is  an  ex- 
periment which  any  loving  and  humble  soul  can  easily  make. 
Take  your  friends,  or  better  still  the  members  of  the  church  to 
which  you  belong,  and  set  yourself  systematically  to  pray  for  them. 
Leave  alone  those  futile  and  often  misguided  petitions  for  temporal 
blessings,  or  even  for  success  in  their  work,  and  plead  with  your 
God  in  the  terms  of  that  prayer  with  which  St.  Paul  bowed  his 
knees  for  the  Ephesians.  Ask  that  this  person,  or  these  persons, 
known  to  you,  may  have  the  enlightenment  and  expansion  of  the 
Spirit,  and  quickened  love  and  zeal,  the  vision  of  God,  the  profound 
sympathy  with  Christ  which  form  the  true  Christian  life.  Pray  and 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  369 

watch,  and  as  you  watch,  still  pray.  And  you  will  see  a  miracle, 
marvellous  as  the  springing  of  the  flowers  in  April,  or  the  far-off 
regular  rise  and  setting  of  the  planets,  a  miracle  proceeding  before 
your  eyes,  a  plain  answer  to  your  prayer,  and  yet  without  any  in- 
tervention of  your  voice  or  hand.  You  will  see  the  mysterious 
power  of  God  at  work  upon  these  souls  for  which  you  pray.  And 
by  the  subtle  movements  of  the  Spirit  it  is  as  likely  as  not  that 
they  will  come  to  tell  you  of  the  Divine  blessings  which  have  come 
to  them  in  reply  to  your  unknown  prayers. 

1.  "  I  read  recently  the  authentic  case  of  a  sailor  coaxed  into  a 
mission  service.  He  left  early  and  unimpressed.  As  he  went 
out,  a  lady  bade  him  good-bye,  and  said,  '  I  shall  pray  for  you '. 
He  returned  a  rough  answer.  Some  days  later  he  astonished  the 
comrade  with  whom  he  had  attended  the  service  by  demanding, 
'  Is  that  woman  still  praying  ? '  *  She  is  sure  to  be,'  was  the 
reply.  He  made  an  angry  exclamation,  but  in  a  few  days,  de- 
spite himself,  he  was  drawn  back  again  and  yet  again  to  the 
service,  finally  to  find  salvation."  ^ 

2.  "  Some  years  ago,  one  of  our  great  expresses  was  rushing 
through  the  night,  and  the  engine-driver  had  to  get  off  his  secure 
place  to  do  something  to  his  engine,  and  missed  his  footing  and 
fell.  How  he  saved  himself  he  never  knew,  but  he  caught  hold 
of  something  on  the  engine  and  swung  himself  back  again  to  a 
place  of  safety.  When  he  reached  home  it  was  the  early  hours 
of  the  morning.  He  took  off  his  boots  and  went  quietly 
upstairs,  not  to  awaken  his  sleeping  children,  and  as  he  passed 
the  room  where  his  little  daughter  was  sleeping  the  door  was 
burst  open,  and  out  she  rushed  in  her  little  nightdress,  flung 
herself  into  his  arms,  put  her  arms  round  his  neck  and  her  cheek 
against  his  and  said,  *  Oh  !  daddy,  daddy,  I  am  glad  to  see  you. 
I  had  such  an  ugly  dream.  I  dreamt  you  were  killed  on  the 
railway,  and  I  got  out  of  bed,  and  I  knelt  down,  and  I  asked 
God  to  take  care  of  you.'  That  strong  man  believes  that  God 
heard  the  prayer  of  that  little  child,  and  that  to  her  he  owes  his 
life,  and  so  do  I"  ^ 

^E.  S.  Waterhouse,  The  Psychology  of  the  ChrisUan,Life,  77. 
2  Bishop  G.  H.  S.  Walpole. 

24 


370   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

3.  "  A  Cambridgeshire  farmer  told  me  that  some  time  ago  a  lad 
of  his,  about  seventeen  years  of  age,  ran  away  to  London.  The 
father  went  in  quest  of  him,  and  visited  all  the  boy's  relatives  in 
the  metropolis,  but  could  learn  absolutely  nothing  of  the  wanderer. 
The  farmer's  task  seemed  hopeless,  like  hunting  for  a  needle  in  a 
haystack.  But  he  believed  in  prayer,  and  on  the  Sunday  morn- 
ing, as  he  stood  in  perplexity  in  the  streets  of  the  great  city,  he 
cried,  *  Lord,  lead  me  to  my  boy '.  Soon  afterwards  he  felt  a 
strong  desire  to  go  to  the  City  Temple,  where  Dr.  Parker  was 
preaching.  On  reaching  the  building  he  was  taken  up  into  the 
gallery,  and  one  of  the  first  persons  he  saw  was  his  missing  son. 
The  lad  confessed  that  he  had  intended  leaving  on  the  following 
Tuesday  for  Liverpool,  from  whence  he  meant  to  go  to  Australia. 
He  returned  home  with  his  father,  saw  the  folly  of  his  conduct, 
and  has  since  become  a  comfort  and  credit  to  his  parents."  ^ 

4.  A  case  was  reported  in  a  recent  newspaper.  I  have  no 
reason  for  either  believing  it  or  disbelieving  it,  beyond  the  fact 
that  there  are  a  thousand  similar  instances  lying  all  round,  and 
this  one  has  been  selected  by  me  because  it  lies  at  hand,  and  will 
serve  for  an  example  of  a  whole  region  of  spiritual  phenomena. 

The  incident,  which  is  reported  in  the  Morning  Leader  of 
29  November,  1904,  is  headed  and  reported  as  follows  : — 

"  Preaching  on  Sunday,  at  Hanley  Tabernacle,  the  Rev. 
Dr.  J.  G.  James,  M.A.,  of  Yeovil,  told  an  extraordinary  story  of 
telepathy. 

"  During  the  South  African  War  a  father  prayed  daily  for  his 
son,  who  was  at  the  front.  One  night,  moved  by  a  strange  im- 
pulse, the  father  felt  bound  to  go  on  praying,  and  he  continued  in 
prayer  until  the  morning. 

"  Some  time  afterwards  a  letter  from  the  front  revealed  a  re- 
markable fact.  On  the  very  night  that  the  father  was  constrained 
to  remain  praying,  his  son  was  taken  out  of  the  hospital,  where, 
unknown  to  his  father,  he  had  been  down  with  enteric,  and 
placed  in  the  mortuary  among  the  dead.  The  hospital  doctor, 
however,  was  possessed  by  peculiar  uneasiness,  and  could  not  rest ; 
so  he  got  up  and  went  to  the  nurse  who  had  ordered  the  removal 
of  the  body,  and  asked  if  she  were  sure  the  patient  was  dead. 

*  W.  Haughton,  Twentieth  Century  Miracles,  9. 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  371 

**  Although  she  said  she  was  sure,  the  doctor  went  to  the  mor- 
tuary, and  found  that  there  was  still  breath  in  the  body.  The 
patient  was  taken  back  to  the  hospital,  and  eventually  restored 
to  health." 

From  an  actual  letter  of  the  father,  published  in  the  Western 
Chronicle,  Yeovil,  23  December,  1904,  we  are  able  to  make  some 
expansions  of  the  story  and  some  corrections.  It  should  have 
been  stated  that  the  news  of  the  young  man's  illness  had  been 
telegraphed  home.     Here  are  his  father's  own  words  : — 

"At  the  commencement  of  his  illness  his  young  wife  received 
a  telegram  from  the  War  OflSce  to  say  that  her  husband  was 
dangerously  ill.  For  all  those  weeks  we  could  hear  nothing  more 
concerning  him.  You  can  imagine  the  anxiety  and  the  intensity 
of  our  prayers.  It  must  have  been  about  the  sixth  week  after 
the  intelligence  of  his  illness,  while  I  was  in  bed  trying  to  sleep, 
he  stood  before  me  erect,  and  waving  his  hand,  said,  *  Good-bye, 
Dad  '.  I  was  immediately  impressed  with  the  consciousness  that 
he  was  in  imminent  peril,  so  rising  and  going  downstairs,  I  spent 
the  night  in  prayer.  .  .  .  About  six  o'clock  in  the  morning,  I  felt 
that  whatever  might  be  the  nature  of  the  calamity  it  was  averted."  ^ 

5.  "  On  one  occasion  I  was  summoned  from  my  study  to  see  a 
girl  who  was  dying  of  acute  peritonitis.  I  hurried  away  to  the 
chamber  of  death.  The  doctor  said  that  he  could  do  nothing 
more.  The  mother  stood  there  weeping.  The  girl  had  passed 
beyond  the  point  of  recognition.  But  as  I  entered  the  room,  a 
conviction  seized  me  that  the  sentence  of  death  had  not  gone  out 
against  her.  I  proposed  that  we  should  kneel  down  and  pray. 
I  asked  definitely  that  she  should  be  restored.  I  left  the  home, 
and  learned  afterwards  that  she  began  to  amend  almost  at  once, 
and  entirely  recovered ;  she  is  now  quite  strong  and  well,  and 
doing  her  share  of  service  for  our  Lord."  ^ 

6.  "  A  young  woman  who  had  found  the  Saviour  at  one  of  the 
meetings  when  Mr.  Matheson  was  with  us,  requested  special 
prayer  one  night  on  behalf  of  her  brother,  a  sailor,  who  had  not 
been  heard  of  for  a  long  while.     Prayer  was  ofiered  for  the  con- 

^  J.  Rendel  Harris,  The.  Guiding  Hand  of  Ood,  53. 
*  R.  F.  Horton,  in  In  Answer  to  Prayer,  78. 


372   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

version  of  the  wanderer.  Some  three  months  afterwards  the 
young  woman  appeared  at  a  meeting,  and  introduced  her  brother 
in  a  state  of  religious  concern.  Strange  as  it  may  appear,  he  had 
been  awakened  at  sea  on  the  very  night  on  which  prayer  had 
been  offered  on  his  behalf.  His  own  account  of  the  matter  was 
this :  He  was  pacing  the  deck  in  the  stillness  of  the  night,  when 
a  thought  about  his  soul  took  hold  of  him,  and  the  more  he  strove 
to  put  it  away  from  him  the  worse  he  grew.  He  had  no  peace 
till  he  returned  home."  ^ 


Spiritual  Communications. 

Before  leaving  the  subject  of  special  answers  to  prayer,  it  is 
fitting  that  some  notice  should  be  taken  of  a  closely  related, 
if  not  quite  identical,  subject — the  experience  which  men  and 
women  have  of  guidance  due  to  some  inward  suggestion,  and 
usually  regarded  as  a  supernatural  communication.  The  subject 
is  presented  by  Dr.  John  Watson  ("  Ian  Maclaren  ")  in  a  paper  con- 
tributed to  a  volume  entitled  In  Answer  to  Prayer,  edited  by 
Bishop  Boyd  Carpenter. 

Dr.  Watson  says :  "  During  the  course  of  my  ministry,  and 
especially  of  recent  years,  I  have  been  moved  to  certain  actions 
for  which  there  seemed  no  reason,  and  which  I  only  performed 
under  the  influence  of  a  sudden  impulse.  As  often  as  I  yielded 
to  this  inward  guidance,  and  before  the  issue  was  determined, 
my  mind  had  a  sense  of  relief  and  satisfaction,  and  in  all  distinct 
and  important  cases  my  course  was  in  the  end  most  fully  justi- 
fied. With  the  afterlook  one  is  most  thankful  that  on  certain 
occasions  he  was  not  disobedient  to  the  touch  of  the  unseen,  and 
only  bitterly  regrets  that  on  other  occasions  he  was  callous  and 
wilful  or  was  overcome  by  shame  and  timidity." 

He  then  gives  three  examples,  of  which  the  following  is  the 
most  striking : — 

"  It  was  my  privilege,  before  I  came  to  Sefton  Park  Church, 
to  serve  as  a  colleague  with  a  venerable  minister  to  whom  I  was 
sincerely  attached,  and  who  showed  me  much  kindness.  We  both 
felt  the  separation  keenly  and  kept  up  a  constant  correspondence, 

*  J.  Macpherson,  Duncan  Matheson,  133. 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER 


373 


while  this  good  and  affectionate  man  followed  my  work  with 
spiritual  interest  and  constant  prayer.  When  news  came  one 
day  that  he  was  dangerously  ill  it  was  natural  that  his  friend 
should  be  gravely  concerned,  and,  as  the  days  of  anxiety  grew, 
that  the  matter  should  take  firm  hold  of  the  mind.  It  was  a 
great  relief  to  learn,  towards  the  end  of  a  week,  that  the  sickness 
had  abated,  and  when,  on  Sunday  morning,  a  letter  came  with 
strong  and  final  assurance  of  recovery  the  strain  was  quite  re- 
laxed, and  I  did  my  duty  at  morning  service  with  a  light  heart. 
During  the  afternoon  my  satisfaction  began  to  fail,  and  I  grew 
uneasy  till,  by  evening  service,  the  letter  of  the  morning  counted 
for  nothing. 

"  After  returning  home  my  mind  was  torn  with  anxiety  and  I 
became  most  miserable,  fearing  that  this  good  man  was  still  in 
danger,  and,  it  might  be,  near  unto  death.  Gradually  the  con- 
viction deepened  and  took  hold  of  me  that  he  was  dying,  and  that 
I  would  never  see  him  again,  till  at  last  it  was  laid  on  me  that  if 
I  hoped  to  receive  his  blessing  I  must  make  haste,  and  by-and-by 
that  I  had  better  go  at  once.  It  did  not  seem  as  if  I  had  now 
any  choice,  and  I  certainly  had  no  longer  any  doubt ;  so,  having 
written  to  break  two  engagements  for  Monday,  I  left  at  midnight 
for  Glasgow. 

"  As  I  whirled  through  the  darkness  it  certainly  did  occur  to 
me  that  I  had  done  an  unusual  thing,  for  here  was  a  fairly  busy 
man  leaving  his  work  and  going  a  long  night's  journey  to  visit 
a  sick  friend  of  whose  well-being  he  had  been  assured  on  good 
authority.  By  every  evidence  which  could  tell  on  another  person 
he  was  acting  foolishly,  and  yet  he  was  obeying  an  almost  irre- 
sistible impulse. 

"  The  day  broke  as  we  climbed  the  ascent  beyond  Moffat,  and 
I  was  now  only  concerned  lest  time  should  be  lost  on  the  way. 
On  arrival  I  drove  rapidly  to  the  well-known  house,  and  was  in 
no  way  astonished  that  the  servant,  who  opened  the  door,  should 
be  weeping  bitterly,  for  the  fact  that  word  had  come  from  that 
very  house  that  all  was  going  well  did  not  now  weigh  one  grain 
against  my  own  inward  knowledge. 

" '  He  had  a  relapse  yesterday  afternoon,  and  he  is  .  .  .  dying 
now.'  No  one  in  the  room  seemed  surprised  that  I  should  have 
come  although  they  had  not  sent  for  me,  and  I  held  my  reverend 


374   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

father's  hand  till  he  fell  asleep  in  about  twenty  minutes.  He 
was  beyond  speech  when  I  came,  but,  as  we  believed,  recognized 
me  and  was  content.  My  night's  journey  was  a  pious  act,  for 
which  I  thanked  God,  and  my  absolute  conviction  is  that  I  was 
guided  to  its  performance  by  spiritual  influence." 

After  relating  his  experiences.  Dr.  Watson  offers  three  infer- 
ences. 

(1)  People  may  live  in  an  atmosphere  of  sympathy  which 
will  be  a  communicating  medium.  When  some  one  appears 
to  read  another's  thoughts,  as  we  have  all  seen  done  at  public 
exhibitions,  it  was  evidently  by  physical  signs,  and  it  served 
no  good  purpose.  It  was  a  mechanical  gift,  and  was  used 
for  an  amusement.  This  is  knowledge  of  another  kind,  whose 
conditions  are  spiritual  and  whose  ends  are  ethical.  Between 
you  and  the  person  there  must  be  some  common  feeling ;  it  rises 
to  a  height  in  the  hour  of  trouble  ;  and  its  call  is  for  help.  The 
correspondence  here  is  between  heart  and  heart,  and  the  medium 
through  which  the  message  passes  is  love. 

(2)  This  love  is  but  another  name  for  Christ,  who  is  the 
head  of  the  body  ;  and  here  one  falls  back  on  St,  Paul's  profound 
and  illuminating  illustration.  It  is  Christ  who  unites  the  whole 
race,  and  especially  all  Christian  folk,  by  His  incarnation.  Into 
Him  are  gathered  all  the  fears,  sorrows,  pains,  troubles  of  each 
member,  so  that  He  feels  with  all,  and  from  Him  flows  the  same 
feeling  to  other  members  of  the  body.  He  is  the  common  spring 
of  sensitiveness  and  sympathy,  who  connects  each  man  with  his 
neighbour  and  makes  of  thousands  a  living  organic  spiritual 
unity. 

(3)  In  proportion  as  one  abides  in  Christ  he  will  be  in  touch 
with  his  brethren.  If  it  seem  to  one  marvellous  and  almost 
incredible  that  any  person  should  be  affected  by  another's  sorrow 
whom  he  does  not  at  the  moment  see,  is  it  not  marvellous, 
although  quite  credible,  that  we  are  so  often  indifferent  to  sorrow 
which  we  do  see  ?  Is  it  not  the  case  that  one  of  a  delicate  soul 
will  detect  secret  trouble  in  the  failure  of  a  smile,  in  a  sub-tone 
of  voice,  in  a  fleeting  shadow  on  the  face  ?  "  How  did  he  know  ? " 
we  duller  people  say.  "By  his  fellowship  with  Christ"  is  the 
only  answer.  "  Why  did  we  not  know  ?  "  On  account  of  our 
hardness  and  selfishness.     If  one  live  self-centred — ever  concerned 


ANSWERS  TO  PRAYER  375 

about  his  own  affairs  there  is  no  callousness  to  which  he  may  not 
yet  descend ;  if  one  live  the  selfless  life,  there  is  no  mysterious 
secret  of  sympathy  which  may  not  be  his.  Wherefore  if  any  one 
desire  to  live  in  nervous  touch  with  his  fellows,  so  that  their 
sorrows  be  his  own  and  he  be  their  quick  helper,  if  he  desire  to 
share  with  Christ  the  world  burden,  let  him  open  his  heart  to  the 
Spirit  of  the  Lord.  In  proportion  as  we  live  for  ourselves  are  we 
separated  from  our  families,  our  friends,  our  neighbours ;  in  pro- 
portion as  we  enter  into  the  life  of  the  cross  we  are  one  with 
them  all,  being  one  with  Christ,  who  is  one  with  God. 

IT  An  American  gentleman  travelling  in  Europe  was  taken 
suddenly  and  seriously  ill  in  one  of  our  northern  towns.  The 
day  before  this  happened,  a  clergyman,  who  was  at  a  distance  in 
the  country,  was  seized  with  a  sudden  and  unaccountable  desire 
to  visit  this  very  town.  He  had  no  idea  why,  but  prayed  for 
guidance  in  the  matter,  and  finally  felt  convinced  that  he  must 
go.  Having  stayed  the  night  there  he  was  about  to  return  home 
rather  inclined  to  think  himself  a  very  foolish  person,  when  a 
waiter  in  the  hotel  brought  him  an  American  lady's  card  and 
said  that  the  lady  wished  to  see  him.  He  was  the  only  English 
clergyman  of  whom  she  and  her  husband  had  any  knowledge. 
They  had  happened  to  hear  him  preach  in  America.  She  had  no 
idea  where  he  lived,  but  when  her  husband  was  taken  ill  she  and 
her  daughter  had  prayed  that  he  might  be  sent  to  them.  On 
inquiry,  strange  to  say,  he  was  found  to  be  in  the  hotel,  and 
was  able  to  render  some  assistance  to  the  poor  sufferer,  who  died 
in  a  few  hours,  and  to  his  surviving  and  mourning  relatives.^ 

IT  One  of  the  most  courageous  and  therefore  helpful  books  on 
this  subject  is  The  Guiding  Hand  of  God,  by  Dr.  Rendel  Harris. 
There  he  says  :  "  A  dear  friend  of  ours,  whose  bright  Christian 
experience  is  a  continual  exhilaration  to  all  who  know  her,  was 
one  day  going  town  wards  on  an  errand  of  some  kind,  when  she 
felt  herself  impelled  in  the  spirit  to  turn  down  another  road. 
She  had  not  gone  far  when  she  came  across  a  poor,  degraded, 
drunken  woman  whom  she  had  been  in  the  habit  of  visiting  and 
whom  she  had  tried  to  help  out  of  her  many  sorrows  and  sins. 
The  wretched  woman  came  up  to  her  and  confessed  that  she  had 
been  on  the  point  of  throwing  herself  into  the  canal,  but  that 
she  had  come  up  the  road  in  question  under  the  feeling  that  she 
would  perhaps  meet  on  the  way  the  friend  who  had  tried  to 

1  Canon  W.  J.  Knox  Little. 


376    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

influence  and  help  her.  It  need  hardly  be  said  that  the  retrospect 
of  that  obedience  to  the  voice  of  the  Inward  Monitor,  which  led 
our  friend  down  the  very  road  where  she  was  wanted,  has  been 
not  only  a  permanent  stimulus  to  her  own  faith  and  love,  but 
has  also  furnished  an  object-lesson  to  others  who  desire  to  realize 
increasing  helpfulness  to  others  by  an  increasing  sense  of  the 
presence  of  the  Lord  with  us,  to  direct  us,  and  to  make  use  of  us. 
And  it  must  be  true  that  when  we  are  trying  to  help  others  with 
ministries  of  love,  we  are  not  acting  apart  from  God,  and  may 
expect  to  find  ministrations  of  the  Paraclete  to  ourselves."  ^ 

^  J.  Rendel  Harris,  The  Guiding  Hand  of  Qod,  100. 


XVIII. 
Prayer  to  the  Trinity. 


Literature. 

Benson,  E.  W.,  The  Seven  Gifts  (1885). 

Broughton,  L.  G.,  The  Prayers  of  Jes^is  (1910). 

Druitt,  C.  H.,  The  Obligation  of  Prayer  (1913). 

Haering,  T.,  The  Christian  Faith,  ii.  (1913). 

How,  W.  W.,  Plain  Words,  iv.  (1901). 

Howatt,  J.  R.,  A  Year's  Addresses  to  the  Yoimg  (1913). 

James,  W.,  The  Varieties  of  Religious  Experience  (1902). 

Law,  W.,  A  Serious  Call  to  a  Devout  and  Holy  Life. 

Liddon,  H.  P.,  The  Divinity  of  Our  Lord  (1890). 

McComb,  S.,  Christianity  and  the  Modern  Mind  (1910). 

McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 

Marfcensen,  H.,  Christian  Ethics,  i.  (1881). 

Salmon,  G.,  The  Reign  of  Law  (1873). 

Simpson,  J.  G.,  The  Spirit  and  the  Bride. 

Thomas,  W.  H.  G.,  The  Holy  Spirit  of  God  (1913). 

Trench,  B.  C.  ,  Sermons  Preached  in  Westminster  Abbey  (1860). 

Walpole,  G.  H.  S.,  Prayer  and  Communion  (1912). 

Worlledge,  A.  J.,  Prayer  (1902). 

Expository  Times,  xviii.  (1907). 


378 


Prayer  to  the  Trinity. 

1.  There  is  no  prayer  at  all  without  a  conscience  speaking  to 
God.  The  act  of  saying  words  of  prayer  without  this  conscious 
speaking  to  God  is  simply  the  shell  without  the  kernel.  Who 
would  not  tremble  to  offer  to  God  such  a  hollow  mockery  ?  But 
while  that  is  no  prayer  at  all  which  is  not  spoken  to  God,  it  is 
plainly  of  vast  importance  to  our  prayers  to  have  true  and  clear 
notions  of  that  God  to  whom  we  speak.  The  character  of  our 
prayers  will  be  greatly  affected  by  the  way  in  which  we  think  of 
God. 

IF  In  his  Varieties  of  Religious  Experience,  Professor  W. 
James  quotes  the  following  amazing  sentences  from  a  private 
letter  written  by  F.  W.  H.  Myers,  and  quotes  them  with  approval : 
"  Prayer  is  the  general  name  for  that  attitude  of  open  and  earnest 
expectancy.  If  we  then  ask  to  whom  to  pray,  the  'answer 
(strangely  enough)  must  be  that  that  does  not  much  matter. 
The  prayer  is  not  indeed  a  purely  subjective  thing ;  it  means  a 
real  increase  in  intensity  of  absorption  of  spiritual  power  or 
grace  ;  but  we  do  not  know  enough  of  what  takes  place  in  the 
spiritual  world  to  know  how  the  prayer  operates ;  who  is  cogni- 
zant of  it,  or  through  what  channel  the  grace  is  given.  Better 
let  children  pray  to  Christ,  who  is  at  any  rate  the  highest  in- 
dividual spirit  of  whom  we  have  any  knowledge.  But  it  would 
be  rash  to  say  that  Christ  Himself  hears  us ;  while  to  say  that 
God  hears  us,  is  merely  to  restate  the  first  principle — that  grace 
flows  in  from  the  infinite  spiritual  world."  ^ 

IF  See  that  you  "  direct "  your  prayer.  You  would  not  drop  a 
letter  into  the  post-box  without  directing  it ;  yet  people  sometimes 
do  something  like  this  with  prayer ;  they  forget  the  Lord  they 
are  praying  to.  Aim  at  nothing,  and  you  shall  hit  it ;  but  aim 
at  something,  and  you  may  hit  it  too.^ 

^  W.  James,  Tha  Varieties  of  Religious  Experience,  467. 
2  J.  Beid  Howatt,  A  Year's  Addresses  to  the  Young,  4. 
379 


38o   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

2.  How  are  we  to  think  of  God?  "As  a  Spirit,"  answers 
Bishop  Walsham  How :  '"  God  is  a  Spirit  and  they  that  worship 
him  must  worship  him  in  spirit  and  in  truth.'  There  must  be  no 
picturing  of  God  to  ourselves  in  any  form  or  likeness.  There 
must  be  no  thinking  of  Him  as  in  one  particular  place.  It  is 
true  we  look  up  to  heaven,  and  often  address  our  prayers  to 
God  as  dwelling  in  the  light  which  no  man  can  approach  unto. 
This  is  perfectly  lawful  and  right,  for  there  is  a  place  where  God 
displays  His  glorious  majesty,  and  to  which  our  hopes  and  aims, 
as  well  as  our  prayers,  are  pointed."  ^ 

But,  says  Dr.  McComb,  "  the  spiritual  world  seems  so  remote, 
intangible,  unreal,  as  compared  with  our  external  environment, 
this  solid  and  substantial  frame  of  things.  We  go  forth  to  meet 
Nature,  and  she  responds  to  us  through  eye  and  ear  and  touch. 
We  speak  with  our  fellow-men,  and  at  once  communion  of  minds 
is  established,  and  all  the  joys  of  human  intercourse  are  ours. 
But  when  we  try  to  speak  to  God  and  hear  Him  speak  to  us,  it 
is  as  though  we  were  in  a  vacuum,  a  soundless  silence  that 
paralyses  utterance.  What  we  miss  is  the  concrete  and  personal. 
When  we  try  to  think  of  the  Infinite  Spirit  our  thoughts  lose 
themselves,  and  we  wander  in  the  immense  vague  and  feel  the 
bewilderment  of  him  who  cried  : — 

'  0  that  I  knew  where  I  might  find  him ! 
Behold  I  go  forward  but  he  is  not  there  ; 
And  backward  but  I  cannot  perceive  him ; 
On  the  left  hand,  where  he  doth  work, 
But  I  cannot  behold  him ; 
He  hideth  himself  on  the  right  hand 
That  I  cannot  see  him.' 

We  try  to  think  of  Him  as  infinitely  wise  and  powerful.  But 
goodness,  wisdom,  power,  are  themselves  impersonal  things,  and 
in  them  the  heart  can  find  no  rest.  Now,  it  goes  without  saying 
that,  without  a  sense  of  the  reality  of  God,  prayer  is  utterly 
worthless."  ^ 

3.  Accordingly  Dr.  McComb  pleads  for  the  recognition  of  the 
Person  of  Christ  in  prayer :  God  will  become  more  real  and  more 

1  W.  W.  How,  Plain  Words,  iv.  11. 

"  S.  McComb,  Christianity  and  the  Modern  Mind,  203. 


PRAYER  TO  THE  TRINITY  381 

personal  to  us  if  when  we  pray  we  recall  the  figure  of  one  whom 
we  have  known  and  loved,  and  brood  on  the  beauty  and  grace  of 
word  and  deed  which  the  memory  will  never  let  die,  and  then  say 
within  ourselves:  ''This  is  God,  only  grander,  more  gracious, 
more  beautiful  by  far  ".  And  from  the  imperfect  embodiments  of 
Divine  grace  we  can  turn  betimes  to  the  pages  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment and  look  at  the  picture  of  the  Son  of  Man  as  there  portrayed. 
We  cannot  look  at  Him  without  feeling  that  in  Him  God  comes 
to  us,  in  Him  God's  love  assumes  visible  embodiment,  God's  holi- 
ness ceases  to  be  an  ideal  abstraction,  takes  to  itself  hands  and 
feet  and  moves  before  us  in  a  familiar  and  irresistible  beauty. 
Putting  ourselves  face  to  face  with  Jesus  Christ,  the  Infinite  and 
the  Absolute  confront  us,  as  it  were,  within  the  limits  of  space 
and  time.  The  whole  history  of  Jesus  is  but  a  parable  of  God's 
attitude  towards  us.  Our  prayers,  therefore,  will  not  lack  de- 
finiteness  or  spiritual  satisfaction  if  while  we  pray  we  imagine 
the  figure  of  Christ  in  some  characteristic  moment  of  His  career. 
As  He  places  His  hand  on  the  sick  and  lifts  disease  from  body 
and  soul,  we  see,  as  in  a  mirror,  the  true  character  of  God,  as 
the  Source  from  which  all  healing,  health,  and  happiness  come. 
When  we  see  Him  ascending  Mount  Olivet  to  weep  the  tears  of 
pity  over  His  beloved  Jerusalem,  what  is  this  but  a  sign  of  some- 
thing still  more  wonderful — the  vision  of  God,  who  from  His 
heavenly  Olivet  is  vexed  by  the  sins  and  touched  by  the  sorrows 
of  His  children  ?  When  we  follow  Him  to  His  last  great  sacri- 
fice, wherein  He  lays  down  His  life  for  the  sinful,  we  see  through 
the  temporal  drama  into  the  eternal  passion  of  God  who,  in  some 
mysterious  way,  is  afilicted  in  all  our  affliction,  and  bears  vicari- 
ously the  burden  of  human  guilt,  and  loves  every  creature  He  has 
made  with  a  love  that  works  through  death  and  disease  and  agony 
to  final  redemption.  If,  then,  we  let  such  thoughts  as  these  fill 
the  mind  as  we  pray,  the  fire  of  devotion  will  not  long  remain 
unkindled,  because  God  will  no  longer  be  silent  unto  us,  but  will 
become  at  once  supremely  real  and  supremely  lovable. 

But  this  seems  to  Bishop  How  dangerous  and  in  any  case 
unnecessary.  We  may  realize  God's  presence,  he  says,  without 
fixing  our  thoughts  on  Christ's  human  life.  When  we  are  about 
to  pray,  we  should  try  to  bring  before  our  minds  the  sense  of 
God's  presence  as  well  as  of  His  listening  ear.      Perhaps  this 


382    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

sense  of  God's  presence  is  sometimes  injured  and  weakenedjby 
the  language  so  constantly  used  as  to  prayers  ascending  up  to 
His  throne  in  the  highest  heavens.  For  instance,  how  often  have 
we  heard  such  a  sentence  as  this  :  "  The  prayer  that  starts  from 
a  lowly  heart  stops  not  till  it  reaches  the  ear  of  God  "  ?  Is  there 
not  something  misleading  in  this  idea  of  a  long  journey  which 
prayer  has  to  make  in  passing  from  earth  to  heaven  ?  Is  it  not 
more  true  to  think  of  God  as  quite  close  to  us  when  we  pray — to 
try  to  realize  and  feel  His  presence  as  surrounding  us,  enclosing  us  ? 
Is  even  this  enough  ?  Or  must  we  not  rather  believe  this  Presence 
to  be  not  only  around  us,  but  within  us,  so  that  God  is  closer  to  us 
than  the  very  air  we  breathe,  and  that  in  speaking  to  Him  we 
are  holding  communion  with  One  who  in  His  wonderful  loving- 
kindness  makes  His  very  abode  with  us?  If  we  sometimes 
think  of  God  in  His  dwelling-place  of  heavenly  glory,  yet  let  us 
often  try  to  feel  the  awful  closeness  of  His  presence,  and  speak 
to  Him  as  we  might  to  a  friend  at  our  side. 

IF  The  first  thing  that  you  are  to  do  when  you  are  upon  your 
knees  is  to  shut  your  eyes,  and,  with  a  short  silence,  let  your 
soul  place  itself  in  the  presence  of  God ;  that  is,  you  are  to  use 
this  or  some  other  better  method,  to  separate  yourself  from  all 
common  thoughts,  and  make  your  heart  as  sensible  as  you  can  of 
the  Divine  presence.^ 

4.  The  diflficulty  of  realizing  the  presence  of  God  in  prayer  is, 
however,  a  real  one.  And  it  is  probably  due  most  of  all  to  our 
habit  of  thinking  of  God  as  distinct  from  Christ,  as  omnipotent, 
omniscient,  and  afar  off,  Christ  being  near  and  very  loving.  But 
God  is  our  Father.  This  is  the  first  thought  with  which  to  ap- 
proach Him  in  prayer.  And  the  second  thought  is  that  His 
Fatherhood  is  not  only  revealed  to  us  by  Christ  but  made  ours 
in  Christ.  The  manifestation  of  God  which  the  Bible  records  is 
the  revelation  not  of  arbitrary  omnipotence  but  of  loving  person- 
ality. The  Being  whom  to  know  is  life  eternal  is  not  a  God 
extraneous  to  the  order  of  the  universe,  whose  leading  attribute 
is  the  power  of  doing  anything  He  pleases,  but  the  soul,  the  life, 
the  pulse  of  this  mysterious  universa 

^  William  Law,  A  Seriaiis  Call. 


PRAYER  TO  THE  TRINITY  383 

IF  There  is  a  story  told  of  an  old  North  Carolina  preacher  and 
backwoodsman  that  has  interested  me  many  a  time.  For  years 
as  a  young  man  he  trembled  on  account  of  his  sins.  He  was 
afraid  of  God.  He  would  go  to  church  and  hear  the  man  of  God 
and  it  would  send  a  chill  all  over  his  body.  Ofttimes  he  could 
not  stay  in  the  place.  He  had  to  get  up  and  go  out.  He  was  so 
afraid  of  God.  He  felt  that  God  was  hunting  for  him  everywhere 
he  went,  and  he  was  running  from  God  all  the  time.  Years 
passed  by.  When  he  would  attempt  to  pray  he  would  see  an 
angry  God.  But  finally,  out  by  the  side  of  a  log  in  the  woods 
one  night,  where  he  had  gone  after  making  up  his  mind  to  get 
peace,  he  came  in  touch  with  Jesus  ;  just  the  process  I  do  not  re- 
member, but  he  came  in  touch  with  Jesus,  and  for  a  moment  he 
forgot  God  and  began  to  talk  with  Jesus.  He  told  Jesus  his 
troubles  and  implored  Him  to  help  him.  Instantly  Jesus  passed 
from  his  mind  and  he  began  to  think  of  God ;  not  a  God  that  was 
out  of  patience — He  was  a  God  loving,  a  God  yearning,  a  God 
seeking  that  He  might  save  and  bless ;  and  He  was  not  afraid  of 
Him ;  he  was  right  with  Him,  closer  than  ever  before,  and  he  was 
perfectly  at  ease  in  His  presence.^ 

IF  I  have  no  wish  to  transfer  Ben  Nevis  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean. 
It  is  only  a  dull  imagination  that  can  interpret  our  Saviour's 
words  about  the  faith  that  removes  mountains  in  a  sense  so 
destitute  alike  of  true  poetry  and  of  genuine  power.  I  am  no 
mathematician,  but  I  doubt  whether  even  a  Senior  Wrangler  has 
much  enthusiasm  for  infinity.  It  may  be  true  that  the  undiscip- 
lined or  indolent  mind  finds  comfort  in  the  thought  of  a  benevol- 
ent Omnipotence  which,  to  use  Matthew  Arnold's  celebrated 
phrase,  can  turn  a  pen  into  a  pen-wiper.  But  of  this  we  may  be 
certain,  that  for  serious  thought  such  speculations  have  no  signi- 
ficance. The  cry  of  suffering  humanity  is  expressed  in  the 
wistful  challenge  of  St.  Philip,  "  Lord,  shew  us  the  Father,  and  it 
sufficeth  us  ".  And  the  response  of  eternal  Love  is  the  assurance 
of  a  Personal  Being  whose  presence  overshadows  the  homeless 
lives  of  men.  *'Be  of  good  cheer  :  it  is  I;  be  not  afraid."  "O 
heart  I  made,  a  heart  beats  here."  ^ 

L 

Prayer  to  God. 

1.  This,  then,  is  the  first  thing,  that  prayer  may  rightly  be 
addressed  to  each  person  of  the  Divine  Trinity  separately.     No 

^  L.  G.  Broughton,  The  Prayers  of  Jesus,  63. 
2  J.  G.  Simpaon,  The  Spirit  and  the  Bride,  168. 


384    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

doubt  most  prayer  should  be  addressed  to  God  the  Father,  as  the 
Fountain  and  Source  of  all  things.  And  perhaps  there  is  some 
need  of  a  caution  in  these  days  lest  this  be  lost  sight  of.  There 
has  been  on  the  part  of  some  a  great  leaning  towards  addressing 
prayer  mainly  to  God  the  Son.  Of  the  lawfulness  and  fitness  of 
such  prayer  we  may  not  doubt.  It  is  God's  will  "  that  all  men 
should  honour  the  Son,  even  as  they  honour  the  Father  ".  And 
if  we  believe,  with  the  Church  universal,  that  Jesus  Christ  is 
"  equal  to  the  Father  as  touching  His  Godhead,"  plainly  worship 
is  His  right.  We  dare  worship  none  but  God.  But  we  worship 
Jesus,  because  we  believe  Him  to  be  God.  Yet  it  is  no  less  true 
that  to  address  our  prayers  mainly  to  Him  may  be  a  dishonouring 
of  the  Father,  even  as  it  is  contrary  to  the  spirit  of  the  Bible  and 
the  usage  of  the  Church. 

IF  That  worship  was  directed  to  each  of  the  three  Persons  of 
the  Godhead  in  the  ante-Nicene  Church,  and  that  the  tribute  of 
Divine  honours  to  the  Son  and  the  Holy  Ghost  as  God  was  not 
the  addition  or  invention  of  later  ages,  has  been  conclusively 
proved  by  Bingham  in  the  Antiquities  of  the  Christian  Church, 
bk.  xiil  ch.  ii.,  and  by  Dr.  Liddon  in  the  Bampton  Lectures  on 
The  Divinity  of  our  Lord,  pp.  387-422  (11th  edition).  S.  Ignatius 
bids  the  Roman  Christians  put  up  supplications  to  the  Lord  that 
"he  .  .  .  may  be  found  a  sacrifice  to  God";  in  S.  Polycarp's 
Epistle  to  the  Philippians,  the  Father  and  the  Son  are  united 
in  benediction  and  intercession ;  in  the  Apologies  of  S.  Justin 
Marcyr  and  Tertullian,  the  adoration  of  Christ  is  asserted  and 
justified;  Origen,  with  occasional  inconsistency  of  language, 
insists  upon  the  worship  of  Jesus  Christ,  illustrates  it  by  his  own 
personal  example,  and  bases  it  upon  the  truth  of  His  Godhead. 
And  in  the  early  Christian  hymns,  such  as  the  Tersanctus,  the 
Gloria  in  Excelsis,  the  Gloria  Patri,  and  the  "  Hail !  gladdening 
light,"  the  worship  offered  to  the  Father  and  the  Son  is  offered 
also  to  the  Holy  Ghost. ^ 

IT  Speaking  of  the  famous  Dr.  Kidd  of  Aberdeen,  Prof.  Bain 
says  :  "  The  first  occasion  when  I  resumed  attending  the  church, 
I  was  taken  all  of  a  heap  with  listening  to  his  first  prayer :  the 
easy  flow  of  language,  the  choiceness  of  his  topics,  and  the  brevity 
of  the  whole,  came  upon  me  like  a  new  revelation."  Dr.  Bain 
also  tells  us  that  it  was  a  common  habit  with  the  Doctor,  in  his 
prayer,  to  "  address  the  three  persons  in  the  Godhead  in  con- 

1  A.  J.  Worlledge,  Prayer,  95. 


PRAYER  TO  THE  TRINITY  385 

secutive  order,  adapting  the  petitions  to  the  specific  personality 
of  each,"  and,  he  adds,  "  I  never  heard  this  done  by  any  other 
preacher  ".^ 

2.  But  it  should  be  clearly  understood  that  in  addressing  the 
Father,  or  the  Son,  or  the  Holy  Spirit,  we  address  the  One 
Eternal  God  under  the  eternal  distinctions  of  His  Triune  Essence. 
To  the  Church  of  Israel,  the  revelation  on  which  worship  rested 
was  summed  up  in  the  sentence,  '*  The  Lord  our  God  is  one  Lord  ". 
To  the  Church  Catholic,  the  name  of  the  one  Lord  our  God  is 
revealed  as  He  is  in  His  Triune  Essence  :  the  Father,  the  Son, 
and  the  Holy  Ghost.  That  revelation  could  be  made  by  the 
God-Man  alone.  In  His  eternal  Person,  He  united  the  uncreated 
and  created  natures,  and  thus  unveiled  to  man  the  inner  eternal 
distinctions  in  the  Divine  nature,  which  are  revealed  also  as 
strictly  compatible  with  the  Divine  Unity.  The  struggle  with 
Arianism  and  the  Creed  of  Nicaea  really  meant  the  reassertion 
of  the  unity  of  God,  and  "  for  the  modern  world,  the  Christian 
doctrine  of  God  remains  as  the  only  safeguard  in  reason  for  a 
permanent  theistic  belief." 

IF  Christian  prayer  is  prayer  to  God  through  Christ.  It  is 
prayer  to  our  Father  in  heaven  ;  yet  our  prayer  does  not  go  to 
the  Father  in  such  sense  as  if  the  Son  and  the  Holy  Spirit  were 
excluded,  as  if  it  dared  not  apply  to  them.  To  the  Son  also  we 
may  and  ought  to  pray,  as  we  ought  also  to  call  upon  the  Holy 
Spirit ;  and  the  Church  has  ever,  yea  from  its  beginning,  done 
both.  But  though  one  or  the  other  of  the  persons  is  preponder- 
antly present  to  the  consciousness  or  the  imagination,  it  still 
remains  the  three-one  God  to  whom  prayer  is  addressed.  ^ 

IF  All  invocation  of  Jesus  is  in  the  last  resort  adoration  of 
God,  who  is  revealed  to  us  in  Him.  Any  additional  honour,  as  it 
might  appear  to  be,  would,  according  to  His  own  clear  declaration, 
be  an  impairment.  Not  always  has  the  Christian  Church,  nor 
have  its  individual  members,  maintained  the  chaste  reserve  of 
the  Church  of  the  first  age  and  its  members  ;  not  always  have 
they  maintained  the  same  confidence.  Prayer  to  the  Saviour  has 
supplanted  prayer  to  the  Father,  and  on  the  other  hand  it  has 
been  suspected  of  being  unchristian.     Heartfelt  confessions  in 

1  J.  Stark,  Dr.  Kidd  of  Aberdeen,  103. 
^H.  Martensen,  Christian  Ethics,  i.  173. 

25 


386    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

truthful  biographies,  together  with  the  prayers  and  hymns  ap- 
pointed for  congregational  devotion,  show  plainly  what  impor- 
tant rights  the  individual  and  likewise  the  separate  circle  have  in 
this  sacred  concern  of  faith,  but  also  how  unchangeable  are  those 
limits  which  are  essential  to  the  religion.  To  genuine  prayer, 
the  mere  supposition  that  the  object  of  its  trust  is  not  a  unity  is 
intolerable ;  but  for  it,  Jesus  is  with  equal  certainty  united  to  the 
Father  in  such  wise  that,  while  there  is  an  invocation  of  the 
Father,  there  is  also  an  invocation  of  Jesus,  with  a  meaning  of 
its  own  which  falls  under  no  suspicion. ^ 

IF  Some  time  since  I  was  two  Sundays  in  an  important  parish 
of  the  north.  Thirteen  hymns  were  sung.  In  all  these  there 
was  but  one  stanza  of  one  hymn  which  was  addressed  to  the 
Eternal  Father,  To  Him  was  addressed  one  seventy-eighth  part 
of  the  Spiritual  Songs  of  His  people.  That  one  stanza  invoked 
Him  as  the  Giver  of  dew  and  of  dewy  sleep.  Everything  else, 
except  certain  eulogies  on  the  Church,  was  addressed  to  our  Lord, 
and  almost  entirely  to  His  Human  Nature.  Now  when  we  con- 
sider that  our  Lord's  mission  was,  as  He  described  it,  to  gather 
"  true  worshippers  to  the  Father,"  we  must,  whatever  allowances 
or  explanations  we  make,  admit  that  the  Divine  offices  of  those 
two  Sundays  lacked  proportionateness.^ 

n. 

Prayer  to  God  the  Son. 

1.  Prayer  to  the  Son  and  the  Holy  Ghost  is  a  necessary  and 
legitimate  development  from  the  Scriptural  doctrine  of  their 
unity  in  the  Divine  essence  with  the  Father.  To  Jesus  Christ 
Stephen  prayed  at  his  dying  hour  in  commendation  of  his 
parting  soul,  and  in  appeal  to  Him  not  to  impute  their  sin  to  his 
murderers  in  condemnation.  Before  Jesus  Christ,  Ananias  pleads 
the  secret  thoughts  of  his  heart,  and,  in  addressing  Him  as  Lord, 
uses  the  significant  phrase,  "All  who  call  upon  thy  name,"  an 
expression,  common  in  the  Old  Testament,  derived  from  the  way 
in  which  prayers  addrCwSsed  to  God  begin  with  the  invocation  of 
the  Divine  name.  To  invoke  Jesus  Christ  in  prayer  as  Lord  is 
to  Paul  the  Apostle  the  practice  of  the  Christian,  as  to  Saul  the 
persecutor  it  had  been  the  mark  by  which  he  had  recognized  his 

1 T.  Haering,  The  Christian  Faith,  ii.  665. 
'Archbishop  Benson,  The  Seven  Gifts,  168. 


PRAYER  TO  THE  TRINITY  387 

victims.  Not  only  in  the  threefold  entreaty  that  the  "  thorn  in 
the  flesh  "  might  be  removed  did  St.  Paul  address  Jesus  Christ, 
but  constantly  in  prayer  for  himself,  in  intercession  for  his  con- 
verts, in  thanksgiving,  and  in  benediction,  where  he  co-ordinates 
the  Father  and  Christ.  And  his  prayer  was  no  expression  of 
passing  emotion.  It  was,  on  the  contrary,  the  result  of  a  very 
definite  conviction.  St.  John  is  speaking  of  the  Son  of  God 
when  he  writes,  "  And  this  is  the  boldness  which  we  have  toward 
him,  that,  if  we  ask  anything  according  to  his  will,  he  heareth 
us :  and  if  we  know  that  he  heareth  us  whatsoever  we  ask,  we 
know  that  we  have  the  petitions  which  we  have  asked  of  him  ". 

Certain  it  is  that  no  sooner  had  Christ  been  lifted  up  from  the 
earth,  in  death  and  in  glory,  than  He  forthwith  began  to  draw  all 
men  unto  Him.  This  attraction  expressed  itself,  not  merely  in  an 
assent  to  His  teaching,  but  in  the  worship  of  His  Person.  No 
sooner  had  He  ascended  to  His  throne  than  there  burst  upwards 
from  the  heart  of  His  Church  a  tide  of  adoration  which  has  only 
become  wider  and  deeper  with  the  lapse  of  time.  In  the  first 
days  of  the  Church,  Christians  were  known  as  "  those  who  called 
upon  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ  ".  Prayer  to  Jesus  Christ,  so  far 
from  being  a  devotional  eccentricity,  was  the  universal  practice  of 
Christians  ;  it  was  the  act  of  devotion  which  specially  character- 
ized a  Christian.  It  would  seem  more  than  probable  that  the 
prayer  offered  by  the  assembled  Apostles  at  the  election  of  St. 
Matthias,  was  addressed  to  Jesus  glorified.  Stephen's  last  cry 
was  a  prayer  to  our  Lord,  moulded  upon  two  of  the  seven  sayings 
which  our  Lord  Himself  had  uttered  on  the  cross.  Jesus  had 
prayed  the  Father  to  forgive  His  executioners.  Jesus  had 
commended  His  Spirit  into  the  Father's  hands.  The  words  which 
are  addressed  by  Jesus  to  the  Father  are  by  St.  Stephen  addressed 
to  Jesus.  To  Jesus  Stephen  turns  in  that  moment  of  supreme 
agony  ;  to  Jesus  he  prays  for  pardon  for  his  murderers  ;  to  Jesus, 
as  to  the  King  of  the  world  of  spirits,  he  commends  his  parting 
soul. 

St.  Paul  tells  us,  "  For  this  thing  I  besought  the  Lord  thrice> 
that  it  might  depart  from  me".  Now  in  the  invariable  usage  of 
Paul's  Epistles,  "the  Lord"  is  not,  as  it  popularly  is  with  us,  a 
mere  synonym  for  God,  but  is  the  special  title  of  Jesus  Christ.  With 
St.  Paul,  as  he  tells  us,  there  were  not  gods  many  and  lords  many, 


388    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

but  one  God  the  Father,  of  whom  were  all  things,  and  we  in  Him ; 
and  one  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  by  whom  are  all  things,  and  we  by 
Him.  The  context  is  sufficient  to  show  that  the  present  passage 
is  no  exception  to  Paul's  ordinary  usage,  and  that  it  is  one  of  the 
proofs  that  the  Apostles  practically  showed  their  belief  in  the 
Godhead  of  their  risen  Master  by  addressing  to  Him  their  prayers. 
The  Lord  had  answered  his  prayer,  "  My  grace  is  sufficient  for 
thee :  for  my  strength  is  made  perfect  in  weakness  ".  And  the 
Apostle  adds,  with  reference  to  this  answer,  "  Most  gladly  there- 
fore will  I  glory  in  my  infirmities,  that  the  power  of  Christ  may 
rest  upon  me,"  showing  most  distinctly  that  Christ  was  the 
Lord  whose  strength  was  made  perfect  in  his  weakness.  **  I 
rejoice  in  weaknesses,  in  insults,  in  necessities,  in  persecutions,  in 
distresses ;  for  when  I  am  weak,  then  I  am  strong." 

IT  When  you  direct  any  of  your  petitions  to  our  Blessed  Lord, 
let  it  be  in  some  expressions  of  this  kind  :  "  O  Saviour  of  the 
World,  God  of  God,  Light  of  Light ;  Thou  that  art  the  Brightness 
of  Thy  Father's  Glory  and  the  express  Image  of  His  Person ; 
Thou  that  art  the  Alpha  and  Omega,  the  Beginning  and  End  of 
all  things  ;  Thou  that  hast  destroyed  the  power  of  the  devil,  that 
hast  overcome  death ;  Thou  that  art  entered  into  the  Holy  of 
Holies,  that  sittest  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Father,  that  art  high 
above  all  thrones  and  principalities,  that  makest  intercession  for 
all  the  world ;  Thou  that  art  the  Judge  of  the  quick  and  dead  ; 
Thou  that  wilt  speedily  come  down  in  Thy  Father's  Glory  to 
reward  all  men  according  to  their  works,  be  Thou  my  light  and 
my  peace,"  eta  For  such  representations,  which  describe  so 
many  characters  of  our  Saviour's  nature  and  power,  are  not 
only  proper  acts  of  adoration,  but  will,  if  they  are  repeated  with 
any  attention,  fill  our  hearts  with  the  highest  fervours  of  true 
devotion. 

Again,  if  you  ask  any  particular  grace  of  our  Blessed  Lord, 
let  it  be  in  some  manner  like  this  :  "  O  Holy  Jesus,  Son  of  the 
Most  High  God,  Thou  that  wast  scourged  at  a  pillar,  stretched 
and  nailed  upon  a  cross  for  the  sins  of  the  world,  unite  me  to 
Thy  cross,  and  fill  my  soul  with  Thy  holy,  humble,  and  suffering 
Spirit.  O  Fountain  of  Mercy,  Thou  that  didst  save  the  thief 
upon  the  cross,  save  me  from  the  guilt  of  a  sinful  life ;  Thou 
that  didst  cast  seven  devils  out  of  Mary  Magdalene,  cast  out  of 
my  heart  all  evil  thoughts  and  wicked  tempers.  O  Giver  of  Life, 
Thou  that  didst  raise  Lazarus  from  the  dead,  raise  up  my  soul 
from  the  death  and  darkness  of  sin.     Thou  that  didst  give  to 


PRAYER  TO  THE  TRINITY  389 

Thy  Apostles  power  over  unclean  spirits,  give  me  power  over  my 
own  heart.  Thou  that  didst  appear  unto  Thy  disciples  when  the 
doors  were  shut,  do  Thou  appear  unto  me  in  the  secret  apartment 
of  my  heart.  Thou  that  didst  cleanse  the  lepers,  heal  the  sick, 
and  give  sight  to  the  blind,  cleanse  my  heart,  heal  the  disorders 
of  my  soul,  and  fill  me  with  heavenly  light."  Now  these  kinds 
of  appeals  have  a  double  advantage :  first,  as  they  are  so  many 
proper  acts  of  our  faith,  whereby  we  not  only  show  our  belief  of 
the  miracles  of  Christ,  but  turn  them  at  the  same  time  into  so 
many  instances  of  worship  and  adoration  ;  secondly,  as  they 
strengthen  and  increase  the  faith  of  our  prayers,  by  presenting 
to  our  minds  so  many  instances  of  that  power  and  goodness 
which  we  call  upon  for  our  own  assistance.  For  he  that  appeals 
to  Christ,  as  casting  out  devils  and  raising  the  dead,  has  then 
a  powerful  motive  in  his  mind  to  pray  earnestly  and  depend 
faithfully  upon  His  assistance.^ 

2.  It  is  true  that  we  look  to  the  Father,  but  only  **  through 
Jesus  Christ "  ;  and  that  "  through  "  is  no  mere  empty  formula, 
but  implies  an  actual  communion  of  thought  and  fellowship  of 
mind.  It  is  true  that  we  yearn  to  know  the  Father,  but  He  is 
known  only  in  Christ.  If  we  are  to  make  any  distinction  at  all 
between  prayer  to  the  Father  and  prayer  to  the  Son,  we  may 
follow  the  Litany,  the  larger  part  of  which  is  addressed  directly 
to  the  Son,  but  the  whole  of  which  is  commended,  both  at  the 
beginning  and  at  the  end,  to  the  Father.  Or  we  may  go  still 
further  back,  and  take  the  Te  Deum  for  our  example.  Here,  as 
a  recent  writer  advocates  with  much  probability,  the  whole  of 
this  Psalm  of  Praise,  except  three  verses,  is  addressed  to  the  Son, 
though  the  worship  of  the  Father  and  the  Spirit  finds  its  place 
in  the  middle  of  the  hymn.  We  cannot  be  wrong,  then,  in  hold- 
ing very  full  communion  with  our  Lord  in  prayer  and  praise, 
whilst  we  shall  naturally,  when  such  spiritual  communion  has 
lifted  us  up  to  the  Father,  conclude  our  devotions  with  the  Lord's 
Prayer  and  such  other  prayers  as  are  immediately  addressed  to 
Him. 

IT  It  is  remarkable  that,  in  spite  of  Jesus'  injunction  to  pray 
to  the  Father,  the  address  to  God  the  Father — with  the  exception 
of  the  simple  exclamation,  "  Abba,  Father,"  which  occurs  twice — 
is  found  only  four  times  in  the  prayers  of  St.  Paul.     Everywhere 

^  William  Law,  A  Serious  Call, 


390  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

else  Christ  is  in  some  way  implicated  in  Paul's  address  to  God, 
for  whom  the  usual  designation  is  "  the  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ ".  This  is  certainly  no  accident.  It  is  an  eloquent  testi- 
mony to  the  dift'erence  that  Jesus  made  in  Paul's  relations  to 
God.     What  God  now  is  to  Paul,  He  is  through  Jesus. ^ 

IF  In  a  recent  number  of  the  Christliche  Welt,  Dr.  Rade,  its 
editor,  a  pronounced  Ritschlian,  declared  he  would  pray  to  Jesus 
Christ ;  his  soul  needed  such  a  devotional  relation  to  Him  ;  and 
whatever  historical  and  anti-metaphysical  considerations  made 
Christ  only  a  man,  his  faith  and  love  and  longing  for  peace 
embraced  Jesus  as  Lord  and  God.^ 

III. 

Prayer  to  God  the  Holy  Spirit. 

No  instance  of  prayer  directly  addressed  to  the  Holy  Spirit 
can  be  found  in  the  New  Testament.  This  may  be  due  to  the  fact 
that  the  Holy  Spirit  is  regarded  as  having  already  been  given 
to  the  believer  as  the  indwelling  presence  of  God,  and  that 
therefore  prayer  to  One  who  dwells  within  may  not  have  been 
considered  suitable. 

But  prayer  is  really  addressed  to  the  Holy  Spirit  when  it 
is  addressed  to  God,  because,  in  the  Unity  of  the  Divine  Essence, 
He  is  one  with  the  Father  and  the  Son.  He  is  invoked  in  bene- 
diction :  "  The  communion  of  the  Holy  Ghost  be  with  you  all ". 
He  is  addressed  in  intercession :  "  The  Lord  direct  your  hearts 
into  the  love  of  God,  and  into  the  patience  of  Christ". 

There  is  yet  a  wider  phase  of  the  subject.  The  Bible  through- 
out, from  Genesis  i.  2,  consistently  presents  the  Holy  Spirit  as 
the  universal  vitalizing  Executive  of  Deity,  the  active  agent  in 
producing,  nourishing,  and  developing  all  life,  beauty,  organic  force, 
and  order  in  the  universe,  the  direct  source  of  the  fragrance  of 
the  rose,  the  flavour  of  fruit,  the  strength  of  the  athlete  (Judges 
xiv.  19),  the  vision  of  prophet  and  poet,  the  equipment  of  Christ, 
the  life  of  enduring  literature  (2  Peter  i.  19-21).  His  function 
in  developing  piety  is  central  but  not  exclusive.  Why  may  we 
not,  how  shall  we  not,  find  Him  everywhere,  converse  with  Him 
on  all  His  glorious  work,  and  seek  from  Him  supplies  through  every 

1  J.  E.  McFadyen,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible,  162. 
^Expository  Times,  xviii.  432. 


PRAYER  TO  THE  TRINITY  391 

department  of  His  productive  power  ?  He  is  in  the  world  as  well 
as  in  the  Word,  and  we  find  Him  and  commune  with  Him,  open- 
eyed,  in  garden  and  grove  as  well  as  in  the  solitude  of  the  closet 
and  in  prayer  for  revivals  and  missions. 

We  gain  greatly  in  the  keenness  of  our  consciousness  of  the 
reahty  of  the  members  of  the  Godhead  by  talking  freely,  natur- 
ally, lovingly  with  them,  in  prayer.  Those  who  pray  to  the 
Spirit  are  not  likely  to  slip  into  the  vague  use  of  the  pronoun 
'*  it "  when  referring  to  Him,  as  though  He  were  only  an  abstract 
force.  He  is  our  Comforter,  our  Guide,  our  Teacher,  and  our 
Friend.  It  is  He  who  makes  Christ  known  to  us.  And  He  uses 
us,  if  we  will  let  it  be  so,  to  make  Christ  known  through  us  to 
others.  Shall  we  not  talk  freely  with  Him  of  this  blessed,  glorious 
mystery  yet  fact,  Christ  the  life  of  the  world,  which  it  is  the 
mission  and  the  passion  of  the  Holy  Spirit  to  bring  fully  to  pass  ? 
God  is  one  God,  though  in  three  persons,  and  we  shall  come  to 
know  God  better  and  better  as  we  come  to  know  the  different 
persons  of  the  Trinity  in  the  sacred  and  intimate  fellowship  of 
the  priceless  privilege  of  prayer,  addressing  them  individually 
according  to  the  need  of  the  moment,  and  in  the  light  of  the  plain 
teachings  of  God's  Word. 

1[  If  it  is  the  Holy  Spirit's  special  function  not  only  to  speak 
to  and  deal  with,  but  also  to  speak  and  work  through,  the  man 
He  renews  and  sanctifies,  we  can  just  so  far  understand  that  He 
the  less  presents  Himself  for  our  articulate  adoration.  But  mean- 
while the  sacred  rightfulness  of  our  worship  of  the  Holy  Spirit 
is  as  surely  established  as  anything  can  be  that  rests  on  large 
and  immediate  inferences  from  the  Scriptures.  If  He  is  divine, 
and  if  He  is  personal,  how  can  we  help  the  attitude  of  adoration 
when,  leaving  for  the  moment  the  thought  of  His  work  in  us,  we 
isolate  in  our  view  the  thought  of  Him  the  Worker  ?  Scripture 
practically  prescribes  to  us  such  an  attitude  when  it  gives  us  our 
Lord's  own  account,  in  His  baptismal  formula,  of  the  Eternal 
Name  as  His  disciples  were  to  know  it — "The  name  of  the 
Father,  and  of  the  Son,  and  of  the  Holy  Ghost "  ;  and  when  in 
the  Acts  and  the  Epistles  the  Holy  Ghost  is  set  before  us  as  not 
only  doing  His  work  in  the  inmost  being  of  the  individual  but 
presiding  in  sacred  majesty  over  the  community ;  and  when  in 
the  Revelation  He,  in  the  mystical  sevenfoldness  of  His  operation, 
Seven  yet  One,  appears  in  that  solemn  prelude  as  the  concurrent 
Giver,  with  the  Father  and  the  Son,  of  grace  and  peace ;  above 


392    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

all  when  in  the  Paschal  Discourse  the  adorable  and  adored  Lord 
Jesus  presents  Him  to  our  faith  as  co-ordinate  with  Himself  in 
glory  and  grace,  "another  Comforter". 

So,  while  watchfully  and  reverently  seeking  to  remember  the 
laws  of  Scripture  proportion,  and  that  according  to  it  the  be- 
liever's relation  to  the  Spirit  is  not  so  much  that  of  direct  adora- 
tion as  of  a  reliance  which  wholly  implies  it,  let  us  trustfully  and 
thankfully  worship  Him,  and  ask  blessing  of  Him,  as  our  spirits 
shall  be  moved  to  such  action  under  His  grace.  Let  us  ever  and 
again  recollect,  with  deliberate  contemplation  and  faith,  what  by 
His  word  we  know  of  Him,  and  of  His  presence  in  us  and  His 
work  for  us,  and  then  let  us  not  only  "  pray  in  the  Holy  Ghost " 
but  also  to  ilim} 

IT  This  is  the  prayer  to  the  Holy  Ghost  in  the  liturgy  of  the 
Armenians  :  "  By  Thee  and  through  Thee,  did  the  offspring  of 
the  patriarchal  family  of  old,  called  seers,  declare  aloud  and  plainly 
things  past  and  things  to  come,  things  wrought  and  things  not 
yet  come  to  effect.  Thou,  O  energy  illimitable,  whom  Moses 
proclaimed  Spirit  of  God  moving  on  the  face  of  the  waters,  by 
Thine  immense  brooding  and  by  Thy  tender  sheltering  of  the 
new  generations  under  the  overspreading  of  Thy  wings  madest 
known  the  mystery  of  the  font;  who  after  the  same  pattern 
spreading  first  the  liquid  element  as  a  veil  on  high  didst  in  lordly 
wise  form  out  of  nothing,  O  mighty,  the  complete  natures  of  all 
things  that  are.  By  Thee  all  creatures  made  by  Thee  shall  be 
renewed  at  the  resurrection,  the  which  day  is  the  last  of  this 
existence  and  the  first  of  the  land  of  the  living."  ^ 

IF  With  the  exception  of  the  third  invocation  of  the  Litany, 
there  is  nothing  within  the  covers  of  the  Prayer- Book,  I  think, 
immediately  addressed  to  the  Holy  Spirit  save  the  hymn  Veni 
Creator.  This  may  be  our  sanction  for  sometimes  employing 
this  soul-invigorating  form  of  prayer,  only  we  must  be  careful  in 
this  case,  as  in  the  case  of  prayers  to  our  Lord,  to  safeguard 
the  unity  of  Almighty  God  Certainly  others  besides  ordinands 
need  the  inspiration  of  this  prayer.  It  forms,  for  instance, 
a  most  helpful  introduction  to  the  act  of  early  morning  private 
devotion,  or  as  a  preparatory  exercise  before  the  reception  of 
Holy  Communion.  The  original  of  this  hymn  in  Latin,  simple, 
vigorous,  and  concise,  is  of  great  antiquity,  though  it  is  perhaps 
impossible  to  trace  its  authorship.  Our  English  version  was 
made  by  Bishop  John  Cosin  of  Durham  in  1660,  and  found  its 

1  H.  C.  G.  Moule,  Veni  Creator,  18. 

*  Alexander  V.  G.  Allen,  Christian  Institutions,  543. 


PRAYER  TO  THE  TRINITY  393 

way  into  the  Prayer-Book  of  1661  (the  longer  version  appeared 
first  in  1549,  and  was  modernized  in  1661).  No  other  Latin 
hymn — the  Te  Deum  alone  excepted — has  taken  deeper  hold  of 
the  Western  mind,  and  its  influence  has  prompted  many  other 
hymns  to  the  Holy  Spirit.  Most  of  these  unfortunately  lack  the 
safegxiard  alluded  to  above.  Of  these  the  most  beautiful — prob- 
ably because  it  represents  in  a  translation  what  Archbishop 
Trench  termed  "  the  loveliest  of  all  the  hymns  in  the  whole  circle 
of  sacred  Latin  poetry " — begins,  "  Come,  Thou  Holy  Spirit, 
Come".i 

IT  St.  Paul  speaking  of  Christ  the  Lord  says,  "  Through  him 
we  all  have  access  by  one  Spirit  to  the  Father  ".  In  this  little 
verse  we  have  mention  of  all  the  three  Persons.  There  is  the 
Father,  to  whom  we  have  access,  or  approach  in  prayer ;  there  is 
the  Son,  through  whom  we  have  this  access ;  and  lastly,  there  is 
the  Spirit,  in  whom  this  access,  this  open  way  to  God  and  to  the 
throne  of  grace,  is  ours. 

(1)  And,  first,  it  is  access  to  the  Father ;  He  is  the  ultimate 
object  of  our  prayers.  I  do  not  say  that  we  do  not  most  fitly  pray 
to  Christ.  He  too  is  God.  Our  Church,  in  more  than  one  of  her 
Collects,  expressly  addresses  herself  to  Him,  makes  her  supplication 
to  Him.  Still  these  are  the  exceptions,  and  not  the  rule.  They 
are  more  often  brief  ejaculations  of  the  soul  that  go  forth  to  Him, 
as  those  in  the  Litany :  "  O  Lamb  of  God,  that  takest  away  the 
sins  of  the  world,  grant  us  Thy  peace";  or  as  this,  "O  Son  of 
David,  have  mercy  upon  us  ".  It  is  these,  rather  than  more  set 
deliberate  prayers,  which  are  addressed  to  the  second  Person  of 
the  Trinity.  We  have  access  to  the  Father^  and  our  prayers 
must  not  stop  short  till  they  mount  up  to  Him.  The  prayer  of 
all  prayers,  that  with  which  the  Son  of  God  taught  us  to  pray, 
begins  with  "  Our  Father ",  O  words  of  comfort  and  strength 
unutterable  for  the  children  of  men!  Conceive  to  yourselves 
what  it  would  be,  how  it  would  fare  with  us,  if  God  only  pre- 
sented Himself  to  us  as  a  God  of  nature,  a  God  of  power,  a  Maker 
of  heaven  and  earth,  with  a  certain  vague  general  benevolence 
and  good-will  toward  us,  in  common  with  the  other  creatures  of 
His  hand.  Think  what  this  would  be  in  our  trials,  our  tempta- 
tions, our  remorse  of  conscience,  our  agonies,  this  God  of  nature, 
as  compared  with  what  is,  a  God  of  men,  a  Father  in  heaven, 
who  opens  wide  a  Father  s  arms  to  His  wandering  and  suffering 
children  here,  and  will  embrace  with  a  Father  s  love,  and  draw 

1  C.  H.  Druitt,  The  Obligation  of  Prayer,  25. 


394   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

them  close  to  a  Father's  heart.  Here  is  the  magic  of  that  word 
of  the  Gospel  which  we  declare,  here  is  its  secret,  attractive  power 
— that  it  wakens  up  in  the  hearts  of  the  poor  prodigals  of  earth 
such  thoughts  as  these,  "I  will  arise,  and  go  to  my  Father  ". 

(2)  But  if  prayer  is  thus  to  the  Father,  it  is,  as  St.  Paul  de- 
clares, through  the  Son.  He  is  the  Daysman  that  must  lay  His 
hand  upon  us  both, — upon  God  and  man,  upon  God  in  heaven, 
and  man  upon  earth,  upon  God  holy  and  man  unholy — and  must 
bring  them  together,  face  to  face,  so  that  man  may  see  God's  face, 
and  not  perish  in  the  seeing ;  may  enter  into  God's  presence,  and 
not  be  consumed  by  the  intolerable  brightness  of  that  presence  ; 
may  speak  with  his  unclean  lips  to  God,  and  yet,  unclean  as  those 
lips  are,  may  speak  not  in  vain,  but  words  which  shall  prevail. 
When  we  affirm,  or  rather  when  Scripture  affirms,  that  all  ap- 
proaches to  God  the  Father,  all  approaches  in  prayer  or  other- 
wise, are  through  God  the  Son,  that  no  man  can  come  to  the 
Father  but  by  Him,  while  by  Him  all  may  come  near,  it  affirms 
herein  the  absolute  holiness  of  God,  the  deep  sinfulness  and  de- 
filement of  man,  which  renders  him  quite  incapable  by  himself 
of  holding  communion,  of  entering  into  fellowship  with  God; 
which  has  put  a  broad  gulf  between  these  two ;  but  it  asserts 
likewise  that  this  gulf,  which  no  other  could  bridge  over,  has  yet 
been  bridged  over  by  Christ ;  that  He  by  His  life,  being  at  once 
God  and  man,  the  two  natures  in  one  person  united,  by  His  death, 
making  a  sacrifice  for  the  sins  of  all  mankind,  has  brought  near 
those  who  were  before  far  asunder ;  that  there  is  now  freedom  of 
access,  an  open  way  to  the  Father,  through  the  Son. 

(3)  But,  thirdly  and  lastly,  it  is  in  the  Spirit  that  this  access  is 
ours.  What  may  this  mean  ?  Prayer,  my  brethren,  is  a  work 
of  grace,  and  not  of  nature.  We  pray  because  God,  God  the  Holy 
Ghost,  puts  it  into  our  hearts  to  pray,  helps  our  infirmities, 
suggests  to  us  what  things  we  ought  to  pray  for,  and  how.  Look 
at  a  ship  without  a  wind,  becalmed  in  the  middle  sea,  its  sails 
flapping  idly  hither  and  thither;  what  a  difference  from  the  same 
ship  when  the  wind  has  filled  its  sails,  and  it  is  making  joyful 
progress  to  the  haven  whither  it  is  bound  !  The  breath  of  God, 
that  is  the  wind  which  must  fill  the  sails  of  our  souls.  We  must 
pray  in  the  Spirit,  in  the  Holy  Ghost,  if  we  would  pray  at  all. 
Lay  this,  I  beseech  you,  to  heart.  Do  not  address  yourselves  to 
prayer  as  to  a  work  to  be  accomplished  in  your  own  natural 
strength.  It  is  a  work  of  God,  of  God  the  Holy  Ghost,  a  work 
of  His  in  you  and  by  you,  and  in  which  you  must  be  fellow- 
workers  with  Him — but  His  work  notwithstanding.^ 

1 R.  C.  Trench,  Sermons  Preached  in  Westminster  Abbey,  229. 


XIX. 

The  Fit  Times  for  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Aitken,  W.  H.  M.  H.,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer  (1902). 
Bliss,  F.  J,,  The  Religions  of  Modern  Syria  and  Palestine  (1912). 
Bounds,  E.  M.,  Power  through  Prayer. 

„  „         Purpose  in  Prayer  (1914). 

Brailsford,  E.  J.,  Thoughts  at  Sunrise  (1912). 
Brooke,  S.  A.,  Sunshine  and  Shadow  (1886). 
Davies,  J.  LI.,  Warnings  Against  Superstition  (1874). 
Drury,  T.  W.,  The  Prison-Ministry  of  St.  Paul  (1911). 
Farindon,  A.,  Sermons,  iv.  (1849). 
lUingworth,  J.  R.,  Christian  Character  (1904). 
Knight,  G.  H.,  Abiding  Help  for  Changing  Days  (1912). 
Lowry,  S.  C,  The  Problems  and  Practice  of  Prayer  (1912). 
MacEvoy,  C,  The  Way  of  Prayer  (1914). 
Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 

„  „       Life  in  His  Name  (1909). 

Martensen,  H.,  Christian  Ethics,  i.  (1881). 
Moore,  D.,  Aids  to  Prayer  (1868). 
Morgan,  G.  C,  The  Practice  of  Prayer  (1909).' 
Moule,  H.  C.  G.,  All  in  Christ  (1901). 
Murray,  A.,  The  Prayer-Life  (1914). 

„         „     The  Ministry  of  Intercession  (1898). 
Randolph,  B.  W.,  The  Threshold  of  the  Sanctuary  (1897). 
Riddle,  T.  W.,  The  Pathway  of  Victory. 
Roberts,  J.  E.,  Private  Prayers  and  Devotions  (1908). 
Sadler,  T.,  Closet  Prayers  (1885). 
Smellie,  A.,  The  Daily  Walk  (1910). 
Tailing,  M.  P.,  Inter-Communion  with  God  (1906). 
Tipple,  S.  A.,  Sunday  Mornings  at  Norwood  (1896). 
UUathorne,  W.  B.,  Christian  Patience  (1886). 
Wesley,  J.,  Works,  viii.  (1872). 
Worlledgo,  A.  J. ,  Prayer  (1902). 

Imperial   and   Asiatic    QuaHerly  Meview,  3rd  Ser.,   xvii.   (1904)   109   (H, 
Baynes). 


396 


The  Fit  Times  for  Prayer. 

1.  Should  we  have  special  times  and  places  for  prayer  ? 

That  is  a  fair  question,  and  one  which  it  is  desirable  to  ask. 
Undoubtedly  the  use  of  this  machinery  of  prayer  is  attended  by 
a  constant  danger — a  danger  which,  if  it  is  forgotten,  becomes 
the  more  threatening.  It  may  betray  us  into  formalism,  into 
the  assumption,  if  not  the  deliberate  conviction,  that  He  who 
seeks  the  worship  of  such  as  will  worship  Him  in  spirit  and  in 
truth,  is  to  be  propitiated  by  outward  shows.  God  is  not,  He 
cannot  be,  thus  propitiated.  Mere  hollow  forms  of  prayer  may 
become  an  abomination  to  Him.  But  regular  times  and  words 
of  prayer  have  always  commended  themselves  to  men  as  being 
necessary  helps  to  the  spirit  of  devotion.  They  are  witnesses 
and  mementoes  of  the  duty  of  praying ;  they  lead  and  encourage 
and  train  men  to  inward  prayer.  And  public  or  common  prayer 
has,  in  addition,  the  virtue  of  awaking  the  common  consciousness 
of  Christians.  We  cannot  pray  together  without  the  use  of 
common  forms ;  and  our  Lord  has  attached  a  special  blessing  to 
the  joint  praying  of  two  or  three  who  are  gathered  together  in 
His  name.  We  know  something  of  the  communion  of  the  saints, 
of  the  fellowship  in  which  Christians  are  spiritually  bound  to 
one  another ;  but  if  we  believed  in  it  and  realized  it  more  heartily, 
we  should  learn  the  strength  in  the  Divine  Kingdom  of  the 
union  of  those  whom  God  has  called  to  be  members  of  one  body, 
and  the  efficacy  of  the  prayers  which  they  offer  through  their 
Head  in  the  one  Spirit.  Before  resolving  to  absent  himself  from 
social  worship  or  to  break  any  other  rule  intended  for  the  common 
edification,  a  Christian  ought  to  satisfy  himself  not  only  that  the 
ordinance  is  not  good  for  his  own  soul,  but  also  that  it  is  one 
of  which  he  may  beneficially  promote  the  general  disuse.  He 
should  ask  not  only,  Can  I  stay  away  from  Church  without  loss  ? 

397 


398    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

but,  Is  it  desirable  that  other  people  also  should  not  come  to 
Church  ? — not  only,  Is  it  profitable  for  myself  that  I  should 
spend  Sunday  in  such  a  way  ?  but,  Would  it  be  better  for  the 
community  in  general  to  spend  it  in  a  similar  way  ?  In  Christ, 
no  man  lives  to  himself ;  and  rules  which  it  is  good  for  the 
whole  body  that  the  members  should  observe  become  thereby 
binding  on  the  individual  members. 

IF  If  thou  love  thine  health,  if  thou  desire  to  be  sure  from  the 
grennes  of  the  devil,  from  the  storms  of  this  world,  from  the 
await  of  thine  enemies,  if  thou  long  to  be  acceptable  to  God,  if 
thou  covet  to  be  happy  at  the  last ;  let  no  day  pass  thee  but 
thou  once  at  the  leastwise  present  thyself  to  God  by  prayer,  and 
falling  down  before  Him  flat  to  the  ground  with  an  humble  affect 
of  devout  mind,  not  from  the  extremity  of  thy  lips,  but  out  of 
the  inwardness  of  thine  heart,  cry  these  words  of  the  prophet, 
"  Delicta  juventutis  meae  et  ignorantias  meas  ne  memineris.  Sed 
secundum  misericordiam  tuam  memento  mei  propter  bonitatem 
tuam  Domine  ".  "  The  offences  of  my  youth  and  mine  ignorances 
remember  not,  good  Lord,  but  after  Thy  mercy.  Lord,  of  Thy 
goodness,  remember  me."  ^ 

2.  But  it  is  in  private  life  and  in  relation  to  private  prayer 
that  the  question  of  time  is  most  acute.  And  here  it  goes  without 
saying  that  it  is  impossible  to  lay  down  rules,  where  none  have 
been  laid  down  by  God.  And  indeed  it  is  not  difficult  to  see  why 
none  have  been  thus  laid  down.  In  all  such  matters  we  have  to 
take  into  account  the  varieties  of  human  temperament,  and  recog- 
nize frankly  that  what  might  be  a  profitable  rule  for  one  might 
prove  a  yoke  of  bondage  to  another,  and  do  harm  instead  of  good. 
Any  kind  of  concentration  of  mind  is  much  more  difficult  to 
some  persons  than  it  is  to  others,  and  these  peculiarities  will,  of 
course,  follow  us  into  our  religious  life,  rendering  it  much  more 
difficult  for  one  person  to  derive  benefit  from  prolonged  devotional 
exercises  than  it  is  for  another.  Then,  again,  we  all  know  that 
the  minds  of  some  people  act  much  more  quickly  than  do  the 
minds  of  others,  and  hence  they  may  get  more  real  help  out  of  a 
few  moments  of  prayer  than  others  could  out  of  a  comparatively 
lengthened  period  thus  employed.  All  this  and  a  great  deal  more 
needs  to  be  taken  into  consideration,  and  must  make  us  careful 

^  Giovanni  Fioo  della  Mirandola. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER 


399 


lest  we  unduly  burden  a  brother's  conscience  with  rules  which, 
at  best,  must  needs  be  of  a  more  or  less  arbitrary  character. 

Nor  is  this  all.  We  must  believe  that  God  takes  our  circum- 
stances as  well  as  our  temperament  into  account,  and  remembers 
how  hard  it  is  for  not  a  few,  in  these  days  of  pressure  and  strain, 
to  allot  to  prayer  the  time  that  they  would  themselves  desire. 
It  may  be  observed,  however,  in  passing,  that  probably,  unless 
our  night's  rest  is  already  much  shorter  than  it  ought  to  be,  the 
body  would  not  suffer  by  the  loss  of  ten  minutes  or  so  of  its 
natural  repose,  while  the  soul  might  be  an  immense  gainer  by  the 
addition  of  those  minutes  to  its  otherwise  hurried  devotional 
exercises.  For  the  really  important  thing  is  that  we  should  not 
be  hurried  ;  that  there  should  be  nothing  hasty  or  perfunctory  in 
our  prayers,  but  rather  spontaneous  and  delighted  intercourse 
of  heart  with  heart.  He  who  prays  because  conscience  demands 
that  he  shall  discharge  a  duty  will  find  his  very  prayer  contribute 
to  loveless  unreality.  He  who  prays,  on  the  other  hand,  because 
he  wants  to  pray  will  not  be  satisfied  with  anything  short  of 
real  spiritual  communion,  and  his  prayer  will  bring  him  into  holy 
and  helpful  intercourse  with  his  God. 

IF  I  remember  hearing  a  helpful  story  of  one  of  England's 
greatest  statesmen,  who  was  as  sincere  a  Christian  as  he  was  an 
ardent  patriot.  It  was  at  a  time  when  we  seemed  to  be  within 
measurable  distance  of  war  with  a  great  European  power ;  and 
men  were  almost  holding  their  breath,  as  they  opened  their  morn- 
ing newspaper,  doubtful  of  what  a  day  might  have  brought  forth. 
The  strain  on  the  nerves  and  judgment  of  those  in  authority 
was  something  terrible,  and  the  post  of  a  Cabinet  Minister  was 
anything  but  an  enviable  one.  A  Cabinet  meeting  was  being 
held,  and  already  there  was  some  irregular  conversation  passing 
from  one  to  another  about  the  crisis,  every  one  betraying  more  or 
less  of  agitation  and  misgiving.  Suddenly  the  door  opened,  and, 
a  few  moments  late,  the  statesman  to  whom  I  refer  entered, 
carrying  on  his  face  that  placid  look  of  settled  peace  which  never 
seemed  to  desert  him,  whatever  might  be  happening  around. 
**  Ah  !  "  said  the  Premier  of  the  time,  as  he  reached  out  his  hand 
to  greet  him,  "  Here  comes  the  *  Central  Calm ' ;  now  we  shall 
get  something  done  ".  And  I  believe  that  this  honourable  sobri- 
quet clung  to  him  for  many  a  day.  "  I  could  have  told  them," 
said  his  wife  to  me,  "  where  he  gets  his  calm  from.  Every  day 
of  his  life,  however  late   he  may  have   been  kept  up  by  his 


400   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

Parliamentary  duties  the  previous  night,  he  always  contrives  to 
have  a  quiet  hour  alone  with  God  and  his  Bible,  and  so  he  is 
ready  for  whatever  may  come."  ^ 


Fixed  Times. 

The  cultivation  of  the  gift  of  prayer  dare  not,  any  more  than 
the  gift  of  meditative  contemplation,  be  left  to  accident,  to  be- 
come a  mere  affair  of  moods  (of  inclination  or  disinclination) ; 
for  in  that  case  prayer  would  far  too  often  be  omitted.  It  must 
become  a  problem  to  every  Christian  to  educate  himself  for 
prayer,  by  subjecting  prayer  to  a  rule,  a  discipline.  In  the  life 
of  a  Christian  there  must  be  an  order  of  prayer,  appointed  times 
of  prayer  ;  and  it  is  a  natural  requirement  that  no  day  pass  over 
without  morning  and  evening  sacrifice. 

1 .  What  is  your  time  each  day  for  prayer  ?  When  do  you  begin 
and  how  long  do  you  continue  ?  The  answer  in  the  majority  of 
cases  is  that  there  is  no  fixed  time.  You  have  a  fixed  time  for 
your  meals,  a  fixed  time  for  your  business,  a  fixed  time  for  your 
games,  but  for  prayer  you  have  no  fixed  time.  You  regard 
prayer  as  a  thing  of  mood  and  to  be  practised  only  when  you 
feel  in  the  mood  for  it.  So  be  it.  Then  the  question  is,  how 
often  does  "  the  mood  "  incline  you  to  pray  ?  How  often  has 
"  the  mood "  impelled  you  to  spend  a  whole  night  in  prayer  ? 
How  often  has  it  impelled  you  to  spend  even  ten  minutes  in 
prayer  ?  Can  you  mention  five  occasions  during  the  year  ?  Can 
you  mention  even  one  ?  It  must  be  seen  that  the  ''  mood  "  theory 
of  prayer  removes  prayer  clean  out  of  the  category  of  the  serious 
business  of  life.  We  should  never  tolerate  in  ourselves  or  in 
others  the  transaction  of  business  by  mood.  But  prayer,  the 
greatest  business  of  life,  we  make  contingent  on  a  mood  which, 
in  turn,  may  be  contingent  upon  wounded  pride  or  corroding 
jealousy  or  over-indulgence  at  the  table  !  Furthermore,  it  must 
be  clear  that  such  a  view  removes  prayer  clean  outside  the  most 
definite  teaching  of  Christ  on  the  subject.  The  teaching  that 
"  men  ought  always  to  pray  and  not  to  lose  heart "  is  a  teach- 
ing  which  directly   contradicts   the   "  mood  "-view   of   prayer. 

1  W.  H.  M.  H.  Aitken,  The  Divine  Ordinance  of  Prayer,  295. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         401 

Violentiam  fac  tibi  ipsi.  In  this  matter  the  words  of  Thomas 
a  Kempis  have  the  ring  of  the  Master.  He  would  have  us  do 
violence  to  ourselves  and  declare  war  upon  all  our  prayerless 
moods. 

IF  Remember  that  in  the  Levitical  Law  there  is  a  frequent 
commemoration  and  charge  given  of  the  two  daily  sacrifices,  the 
one  to  be  offered  up  in  the  morning  and  the  other  in  the  evening. 
These  offerings  by  incense  our  holy,  harmless,  and  undefiled  High 
Priest  hath  taken  away,  and  instead  of  them  every  devout 
Christian  is  at  the  appointed  times  to  offer  up  a  spiritual  sacrifice, 
namely,  that  of  prayer :  for  "  God  is  a  spirit :  and  they  that  worship 
him  must  worship  him  in  spirit  and  in  truth ".  At  these  pre- 
scribed times,  if  thou  wilt  have  thy  prayers  to  ascend  up  before 
God,  thou  must  withdraw  from  all  outward  occupations,  to  pre- 
pare for  the  inward  and  Divine.^ 

2.  The  saints  of  old  observed  regular  times  for  prayer.  One 
Psalmist  mentions  "  seven  times  a  day  "  (Ps.  cxix.  164),  and  on 
this  the  Mediaeval  Church  based  the  seven  canonical  hours  of 
prayer.  The  word  "seven"  here,  as  in  many  other  places,  is 
probably  a  round  number,  not  to  be  taken  with  literal  exactness 
and  simply  meaning  '*  several  ".  More  precise,  probably,  is  the 
utterance  of  another  psalm  (Ps.  Iv.  18) :  "  At  morning,  and  evening, 
and  at  noontide,"  which  reminds  us  of  Daniel's  custom  of  praying 
"  three  times  a  day  "  (Dan.  iv.  10).  Whatever  the  number  may 
be,  the  point  to  be  insisted  on  is  that  every  one  should  have  his 
definite  and  regular  times  for  prayer,  and,  if  possible,  let  nothing 
trespass  upon  them. 

IT  According  to  the  tradition  of  Islam,  the  institution  of  prayer 
five  times  a  day  was  introduced  by  the  great  prophets,  and  these 
devotional  periods  are  therefore  dedicated  to  them.  The  Christian 
may  perhaps  be  led  to  ask  whether  such  frequent  occasions  for 
daily  worship  may  not  lead  at  last  to  pure  formality,  and  a 
fettering  rather  than  a  freeing  of  the  spirit ;  but  there  can  be  no 
question  either  as  to  the  reverence  of  the  worshipper  or  the 
intense  earnestness  of  the  Mu'azzin's  cry:  "Come,  come!  for 
prayer  is  better  than  sleep  !  "  Five  times  comes  the  call,  which 
no  follower  of  Muhammad  can  ever  resist.  They  are  as  follows  : 
(a)  At  daybreak,  when,  being  cast  out  of  Paradise  and  falling  to 

^  Henry  Vaughan. 
26 


402    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

the  earth,  Adam  prayed.  Finding  himself  enveloped  in  darkness, 
he  could  not  but  thank  God  for  the  first  grey  streaks  of  dawn 
when  they  appeared  upon  the  horizon.  (6)  At  midday,  when 
Noah  prayed,  having  got  safely  with  his  family  into  the  ark.  At 
midday  also  Abraham  was  thrown  by  Nimrod  into  the  fiery 
oven,  when  by  prayer  the  furnace  was  changed  into  a  garden  of 
roses,  (c)  In  the  afternoon  Moses  gave  thanks  to  God  when  he 
had  safely  crossed  the  Red  Sea  with  the  Israelites,  (d)  In  the 
evening  the  Lord  Jesus  prayed  upon  the  cross  and  committed  His 
Spirit  to  God.  (e)  At  night  all  the  other  prophets  prayed — 
Joseph  in  the  pit ;  Jonah  in  the  whale ;  Sachariah  as  he  was  being 
torn  to  pieces ;  Shoeb,  Moses'  father-in-law ;  Hud  the  wind-maker; 
the  Seven  Sleepers,  etc. ;  last  of  all  Muhammad,  when  in  a  vision 
he  saw  his  people  in  hell,  and  made  intercession  for  them.^ 

IF  This  call  to  prayer,  sung  in  a  sort  of  florid  chant,  rings  out 
above  every  mosque  in  Islam.  In  Turkey  the  flag  often  floats 
over  the  minaret  during  the  function.  The  crier,  or  Mu'azzin,  is 
often  chosen  for  the  strength  and  sweetness  of  his  voice.  In  a 
closely  built  city  like  Sidon  it  is  inspiring  to  listen  from  the  house 
bop  to  this  human  carillon,  borne  through  the  sunset  glow  from 
minaret  to  minaret,  with  many  a  variety  of  key  and  cadence. 
The  singer  first  faces  the  south,  turning  to  the  other  points  of  the 
compass  as  the  chant  proceeds.  In  the  minarets  of  the  large 
mosques  the  singers  may  be  two  or  more,  chanting  now  alter- 
nately, now  in  unison.  "God  is  great!"  they  call  four  times, 
and  then  repeat  the  phrases  :  "  I  testify  that  there  is  no  God  but 
God  !  I  testify  that  Muhammad  is  the  prophet  of  God  !  Come  to 
prayer !  Come  to  salvation  !  God  is  great.  .  .  .  Mercy  and 
peace  be  unto  thee,  0  prophet  of  God  !  "  In  some  lands  after  the 
first  or  morning  call  the  words  are  added :  "  Prayer  is  better  than 
sleep  !  "  2 

3.  To  hurry  over  this  duty  would  be  to  rob  ourselves  of  the 
benefits  which  proceed  from  it.  We  know,  of  course,  that  prayer 
cannot  be  measured  by  divisions  of  time.  But  the  advantages  to 
be  derived  from  secret  prayer  are  not  to  be  obtained  unless  we 
enter  on  it  with  deliberation.  We  must  *'  shut  the  door,"  enclosing 
and  securing  a  suflBcient  portion  of  time  for  the  fitting  discharge 
of  the  engagement  before  us.  Prayer  has  the  power  of  sanctifying 
life  because  it  brings  God  into  life.     Twice  in  the  day  it  has  been 

^  H.  BayneB,  in  The  Imperial  and  Asiatic  Quarterly  Review,  Jan.  1904,  p.  109. 
2  F.  J.  Bliss,  The  Religions  of  Modern  Syria  and  Palestine,  200. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         403 

for  ages  the  habit  of  the  race  to  use  this  talisman,  once  for  the 
sanctification  of  the  day,  once  for  the  sanctification  of  the  night. 
The  morning  prayer  chimes  in  with  the  joy  of  the  creation,  with 
the  quick  world  as  it  awakes  and  sings. 

IF  Dr.  Maclaren,  that  prince  of  expositors,  realized  the  necessity 
of  the  shut  door.  Every  morning  from  nine  till  ten  he  had  a 
quiet  hour  with  God.  In  the  solitude  of  silence,  his  Bible  on  his 
knees,  he  claimed  the  Divine  gift  of  power.  Dr.  Alexander 
Whyte  has  also  emphasized  this  great  truth ;  he,  on  the  other 
hand,  finds  the  last  hours  of  night  most  blessed  to  his  soul.  He 
says,  *'  For  myself,  I  always  feel  that  Divine  things  thrive  best 
with  me,  aye,  and  all  things  else,  when  I  let  nothing  invade  me 
and  my  Bible  between  ten  and  eleven  at  night.  And  you  also 
are,  as  a  rule,  free  from  all  your  day's  work,  and  from  all  your 
entertainments,  and  from  all  your  visitors  by  that  hour.  And  it 
is  about  that  hour  that  your  Bible  always  says  to  you — unless 
you  have  completely  silenced  its  voice  by  your  long  neglect  of  it — 
*  What ! '  it  says  to  you,  '  can  you  not  watch  with  me  one  hour  ? ' 
For  it  knows,  and  He  who  puts  it  into  your  hand  knows,  that 
that  hour,  so  spent,  would  be  the  best  hour  for  you  of  all  your 
twenty-four."  ^ 

(I)  In  the  morning. — In  the  morning  we  should  look  forward 
to  the  duties  of  the  day,  anticipating  those  situations  in  which 
temptation  may  lurk,  and  preparing  ourselves  to  embrace  such 
opportunities  of  usefulness  as  may  be  presented  to  us.  The  men 
who  have  done  the  most  for  God  in  this  world  have  been  early 
on  their  knees.  He  who  fritters  away  the  early  morning,  its  op- 
portunity and  freshness,  in  other  pursuits  than  seeking  God  will 
make  poor  headway  seeking  Him  the  rest  of  the  day.  If  God  is 
not  first  in  our  thoughts  and  efibrts  in  the  morning,  He  will  be 
in  the  last  place  the  remainder  of  the  day. 

But  it  is  sad  to  think  how  often  we  make  the  urgency  of 
business,  or  our  own  weariness  of  body  and  mind,  an  excuse  for 
curtailing  within  the  narrowest  space,  or  neglecting  altogether, 
our  morning  intercourse  with  God.  We  can  even  persuade  our- 
selves that  to  keep  sacred  a  special  time  for  private  devotion 
savours  of  formalism,  and  thus  we  neglect  a  plain  duty  on  the 
plea  of  avoiding  a  dangerous  Pharisaism :  or  we  tell  ourselves 
that  it  is  better  to  leave  our  praying  till  we  have  a  more  pressing 

1  T.  W.  Riddle,  T/w  Pathway  of  Victory,  119. 


404   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

sense  of  need.  Sometimes  we  may  let  an  inconvenient  situation 
for  prayer,  the  want  of  a  place  secret  enough  and  far  enough  re- 
moved from  disturbance,  excuse  us  from  it.  Sometimes  social 
or  family  prayer  is  thought  to  absolve  us  from  the  duty  of 
private  prayer.  Sometimes  it  is  postponed  from  the  want  of 
what  we  call  a  right  spiritual  tone,  discomposure  of  mind  through 
a  world  of  cares  preventing  us  from  getting  the  stillness  of  soul 
required  for  communion  with  God.  Sometimes,  too,  we  are 
hindered  from  it  by  the  sense  of  recent  sin,  the  guilt  of  which, 
lying  on  our  conscience,  whispers  to  us  that  the  prayer  of  such  a 
heart  as  ours  would  be  only  a  mockery  of  God. 

The  great  obstacle,  however,  is  the  tendency  to  look  upon 
prayer  more  as  a  cold  duty  than  as  a  blessed  privilege  and  joy, 
a  direct  and  simple-hearted  talk  with  a  loving  Father  in  heaven, 
able  to  help  and  waiting  to  help  whenever  a  cry  for  help  reaches 
His  listening  ear.  If  we  only  realized  more  fully  the  heart  of  our 
Father,  to  unburden  our  own  heart  to  Him  would  be  our  greatest 
joy.  As  our  love  to  Him  grows,  our  love  of  prayer  will  grow,  in 
ever-new  delightfulness,  along  with  it.  As  we  continue  musing 
the  fire  will  burn,  till  we  would  not  miss  that  fellowship  for  all 
the  world. 

IF  If  there  is  any  time  in  the  twenty-four  hours  when  men 
and  women  should  pray,  it  is  before  the  wheels  of  the  activities 
of  the  day  have  begun  to  revolve.  The  King  who  tells  us,  "  I 
prevented  the  dawning  of  the  morning  and  cried,"  had  realized 
this.  It  was  with  the  words  of  the  Hundred  and  Twenty-seventh 
Psalm,  "  Except  the  Lord  build  the  house,  they  labour  in  vain 
that  build  it,"  ringing  in  his  ears  that  Benjamin  Franklin,  speak- 
ing before  the  Convention  assembled  to  frame  a  Constitution  for 
the  United  States  of  America,  pleaded  thus  for  the  offering  of 
daily  prayers  in  the  House  of  Representatives : — 

"  I  have  lived  for  eighty-one  years,  and  the  longer  I  live  the 
more  convincing  proof  I  see  of  this  truth — that  God  governs  in 
the  affairs  of  men.  I  also  believe  that  without  His  concurring 
aid  we  shall  proceed  in  this  political  building  no  better  than  the 
builders  of  Babel.  I  therefore  beg  leave  to  move  that  henceforth 
prayers  imploring  the  assistance  of  Heaven  and  its  blessings  on 
our  deliberations  be  held  in  this  assembly  every  morning  before 
we  proceed  to  business."  ^ 

*  E.  J.  Brailsford,  Thoughts  at  Sunrise,  97. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         405 

IF  I  ought  to  pray  before  seeing  any  one.  Often  when  I 
sleep  long,  or  meet  others  early,  it  is  eleven  or  twelve  o'clock 
before  I  begin  secret  prayer.  This  is  a  wretched  system.  It  is 
unscriptural.  Christ  arose  before  day  and  went  into  a  solitary 
place.  David  says:  "Early  will  I  seek  thee";  "Thou  shalt 
early  hear  my  voice  ".  Family  prayer  loses  much  of  its  power 
and  sweetness,  and  I  can  do  no  good  to  those  who  come  to  seek 
from  me.  The  conscience  feels  guilty,  the  soul  unfed,  the  lamp 
not  trimmed.  Then  when  in  secret  prayer  the  soul  is  often  out 
of  tune.  I  feel  it  is  far  better  to  begin  with  God — to  see  His 
face  first,  to  get  my  soul  near  Him  before  it  is  near  another.^ 

IF  For  the  first  sight  of  Mont  Blanc  there  must  always  be  a 
notch  in  the  traveller's  staff,  and  the  vision  must  always  remain. 
I  reached  the  Chamounix  Valley  in  the  dusk  of  the  evening,  when 
the  presence  of  the  surrounding  hills  could  be  only  felt  and  not 
seen.  The  stars  were  not  shining,  and  no  peaks  were  visible, 
and  even  the  lowermost  slopes  of  the  monarch  of  all  the  mountains 
were  hidden  from  view.  The  night  wore  away.  Sleep  in  such 
company  was  almost  an  impertinence.  What  else  could  one  do 
but  look  out  of  the  window  from  time  to  time  and  watch  for  the 
morning  ?  At  last,  on  the  snow-covered  head  of  Mont  Blanc, 
which  touched  the  far-away  heaven,  there  rested  the  rosy  glow  of 
the  dawn.  The  impression  of  that  moment  can  never  be  efiaced. 
It  has  often  helped  a  blind  and  halting  faith.  How  near  to  us 
is  the  subhme  presence  of  God,  although  we  see  Him  not !  ^ 

IT  Dr.  Kidd's  grandson,  Mr.  Henry  Oswald,  afterwards  one  of 
the  magistrates  of  Aberdeen,  who,  when  a  boy,  was  for  some  time 
resident  in  the  minister's  house,  has  left  amongst  his  papers  a 
most  vivid  account  of  the  impression  made  upon  his  mind  by  Dr. 
Kidd's  heroic  devotion  to  duty  in  the  early  morn  :  "In  the  dark- 
ness of  a  cold  winter  morning  I  have  once  and  again  heard  him 
rising  while  the  rest  of  the  household  was  hushed  in  slumber.  I 
listened  while  he  patiently  lit  his  fire,  not  with  the  ready  help 
of  lucifer  matches,  but  with  flint  and  steel  eliciting  a  spark  (how 
little  we  modems  prize  our  luxuries !)  ;  then  he  began  to 
breathe  out  his  soul  in  the  most  earnest  tones  at  the  throne  of 
grace  ;  the  utterances  of  his  devout  heart  were  not  audible  to  me, 
who  was  in  an  adjoining  room,  but,  youngster  as  I  was,  I  felt 
awed  as  I  heard  the  sound  of  prayer  that  often  became  wrestling, 
and  I  knew  that  the  man  I  revered  was  doing  business  with 
God."  3 

^R.  M.  McCheyne.  "^E.  J.  Brailsford,  Thotights  at  Sunrisa,  13. 

3  J.  Stark,  Dr.  Kidd  of  Aberdeen,  128. 


4o6    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

When  first  thy  eyes  unveil,  give  thy  soul  leave 

To  do  the  like  ;  our  bodies  but  forerun 
The  spirit's  duty.     True  hearts  spread  and  heave 

Unto  their  God,  as  flow'rs  do  to  the  sun  ; 
Give  Him  thy  first  thoughts  then  ;  so  shalt  thou  keep 
Him  company  all  day,  and  in  Him  sleep. 

Walk  with  thy  fellow-creatures  :  note  the  hush 
And  whispers  amongst  them.     There's  not  a  spring 

Or  leaf  but  hath  his  morning-hymn.     Each  bush 
And  oak  doth  know  I  AM.     Canst  thou  not  sing  ? 

0  leave  thy  cares  and  follies  !  go  this  way ; 

And  thou  art  sure  to  prosper  all  the  day.^ 

(2)  In  the  evening. — What  shall  be  our  attitude  when  the  day 
is  far  spent  and  the  time  for  rest  draws  near  ?  Shall  we  allow 
the  gracious  Companion  who  has  travelled  part  of  our  way  with 
us  to  leave  us  ?  It  would  be  wiser  to  pray  "  Abide  with  us,"  and 
to  enter  the  inner  chamber  of  communion  with  Him  before  the 
curtains  of  night  are  quite  drawn. 

II  The  disciples  returned  at  evening  and  made  a  report  to 
Christ  of  their  work.  Thus  I  tell  Him  of  my  life  during  the  day, 
my  dealings  with  persons  who  have  come  into  it,  and  whatever 
has  been  attempted — in  short,  the  whole  day's  work ;  its  efibrts, 
failures,  mistakes,  sins,  and  joy.     That  is  my  evening  prayer.^ 

IT  Very  earnestly  would  I  advise  the  dedication  to  Secret 
Prayer  of  a  strictly  regular  time;  a  punctual  beginning,  and, 
especially  in  the  morning,  a  measured  and  liberal  allotment.  If 
I  plead  less  earnestly  for  a  large  allowance  of  time  at  night,  I  do 
it  with  hesitation  and  reserve,  and  only  because  a  conscientious 
Christian,  who  is  doing  the  will  of  God  through  the  day,  is  likely 
to  be  physically  tired  at  night  in  a  way  in  which  he  will  not  be, 
certainly  in  his  youth,  in  the  morning.^ 

Who  goes  to  bed  and  doth  not  pray, 
Maketh  two  nights  of  every  day.^ 

(3)  Midday. — Then,  in  the  mid-time  of  the  day,  if  one  is  able 
to  create  amid  the  whirl  of  traffic  a  silent  space,  how  blessedly 
that  leisure  may  be  employed  in  contemplating  ^^the  Divine  Being 

1  Henry  Vaughan. 

'  Jesus  and  I  are  Friende  :  Life  of  the  Bev.  J.  R.  Miller,  228. 

»H.  C.  G.  Moule.  *  George  Herbert. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         407 

and  in  pouring  out  one's  heart  before  Him  !  The  tangled  skeins 
are  unravelled  then,  heat  and  fret  are  taken  out  of  the  heart, 
the  perplexed  path  is  made  plain,  burdens  and  anxieties  are 
rolled  on  Christ,  rough  ways  become  smooth  and  crooked  places 
are  made  plain.  In  the  mid-hour  of  the  day  God  spreads  a  table 
before  us,  in  the  presence  of  our  enemies. 

Daniel  could  not  be  content  with  private  devotions  in  the 
morning  and  in  the  evening.  He  kneeled  in  his  chamber  three 
times  a  day,  having  his  windows  open  toward  Jerusalem.  This 
devotion  was  private.  The  windows  were  not  open  toward 
Babylon  that  he  might  be  seen  of  men  to  pray,  but  toward 
Jerusalem  where  his  God  dwelt.  Are  our  windows  open  suf- 
ficiently often  if  we  open  them  only  for  a  few  minutes  in  the 
morning  and  in  the  evening  ?  From  rising  till  retiring  is  rather 
a  long  spell  without  an  open  window.  Foul  air  accumulates, 
and  much  fresh  breeze  from  the  heights  of  Zion  is  excluded, 
unless  there  is  an  opportunity  for  airing  the  soul's  habitation 
between  these  times.  If  we  leave  the  windows  that  look  toward 
Jerusalem  closed  for  so  many  hours,  our  spirit  will  become  drowsy 
and  even  unhealthy.  It  is  good  to  have  a  third  hour  in  each 
day  when  the  door  may  be  closed,  and  the  window  may  be  opened, 
and  the  soul  may  be  refreshed  by  a  vision  of  God. 

IF  And  here  I  was  counselled  to  set  up  one  other  sail,  for 
before  I  prayed  but  twice  a  day,  I  here  resolved  to  set  some  time 
apart  at  midday  for  this  effort,  and,  obeying  this,  I  found  the 
effects  to  be  wonderful.^ 

At  noon  as  he  lay  in  the  sultriness  under  his  broad  leafy  limes, 
Far  sweeter  than  murmuring  waters  came  the  toll  of  the  Angelus 

chimes ; 
Pious  and  tranquil  he  rose,  and  uncovered  his  reverend  head, 
And  thrice  was  the  Ave  Maria  and  thrice  was  the  Angelus  said. 
Sweet  custom  the  South  still  retaineth,  to  turn  for  a  moment 

away 
From  the  pleasures  and  pains  of  existence,  from  the  trouble  and 

turmoil  of  day, 
From  the  tumult  within  and  without,  to  the  peace  that  abideth 

on  high, 
When  the  deep  solemn  sound  from  the  belfry  comes  down  like  a 

voice  from  the  sky. 

^Memoirs  of  the  Rav.  James  Eraser ,  208. 


4o8   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

(4)  At  night — The  Psalms  contain  many  references  to  prayer 
and  meditation  during  the  "  night  watches  ".  David,  like  Jacob, 
realized  that  God  "  visited  "  him  "  in  the  night ". 

IF  Mr.  Strachey,  writing  to  Lady  Louis,  says  :  "  You  once 
expressed  a  wish  to  be  sure  that  Maurice  had  as  much  personal 
religion  as  knowledge  of  spiritual  truth.  I  think  you  have  since 
learnt  enough  to  satisfy  you  on  this  point ;  but  you  will  be 
interested  in  hearing  that  Miss  B.,  speaking  of  him,  said,  '  He  is 
a  man  of  much  prayer  ;  his  sisters  told  me  that  when  he  was 
with  them  they  frequently  found  that  he  had  not  been  in  bed  all 
night,  having  spent  the  whole  night  in  prayer '."  ^ 

IF  I  am  not  surprised  at  David's  praying  to  God  in  the  night 
watches ;  in  his  rising  from  his  bed  and  ascending  to  the  roof  of 
his  house,  and  when  the  "  mighty  heart "  of  the  city  "  was  lying 
still,"  and  "  the  mountains  which  surrounded  Jerusalem  "  were 
sleeping  in  the  calm  brilliancy  of  an  Eastern  night,  that  he  should 
gaze  with  rapture  on  the  sky,  and  pour  forth  such  a  beautiful 
psalm  of  praise  as  "  When  I  consider  the  heavens,  the  work  of 
thy  fingers  ". 

The  night  is  more  suited  to  prayer  than  the  day.  I  never 
awake  in  the  middle  of  the  night  without  feeling  induced  to 
commune  with  God.  One  feels  brought  more  into  contact  with 
Him.  The  whole  world  around  us,  we  think,  is  asleep.  God 
the  Shepherd  of  Israel  slumbers  not,  nor  sleeps.  He  is  awake, 
and  so  are  we !  We  feel,  in  the  solemn  and  silent  night,  as  if 
alone  with  God.  And  then  there  is  everything  in  the  circum- 
stances around  you  to  lead  you  to  pray.  The  past  is  often  vividly 
recalled.  The  voices  of  the  dead  are  heard,  and  their  forms  crowd 
around  you.  No  sleep  can  bind  them.  The  night  seems  the  time 
in  which  they  should  hold  spiritual  commune  with  man.  The 
future  too  throws  its  dark  shadow  over  you — the  night  of  the 
grave,  the  certain  death-bed,  the  night  in  which  no  man  can  work. 
And  then  everything  makes  such  an  impression  on  the  mind  at 
night,  when  the  brain  is  nervous  and  susceptible  ;  the  low  sough 
of  the  wind  among  the  trees,  the  roaring,  or  eerie  whish  of  some 
neighbouring  stream,  the  bark  or  low  howl  of  a  dog,  the  general 
impressive  silence,  all  tend  to  sober,  to  solemnize  the  mind,  and 
to  force  it  from  the  world  and  its  vanities,  which  then  seem 
asleep,  to  God,  who  alone  can  uphold  and  defend.^ 

^  The  Life  of  Frederick  Denison  Maurice,  i.  205. 
^Memoir  of  Norman  Macleod,  i.  151. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         409 

11. 

Frequent  Occasions. 
1.  The  cultivation  of  the  habit  of  prayer  will  secure  its  ex- 
pression on  all  suitable  occasions. 

(1)  In  times  of  need,  in  the  first  instance  ;  almost  every  one 
will  pray  then.  Moses  stood  on  the  shores  of  the  Red  Sea,  sur- 
veying the  panic  into  which  the  children  of  Israel  were  cast  when 
they  realized  that  the  chariots  of  Pharaoh  were  thundering  down 
upon  them.  "  Wherefore  criest  thou  unto  me  ? "  said  the  Lord. 
Nehemiah  stood  before  King  Artaxerxes.  The  monarch  noted 
his  inward  grief,  and  said,  "  Why  is  thy  countenance  sad,  seeing 
thou  art  not  sick  ?  This  is  nothing  else  but  sorrow  of  heart." 
That  question  opened  the  door  to  admit  the  answer  to  three 
months'  praying ;  and  the  hot  desire  that  had  risen  to  God  in 
those  slow  months  gathered  itself  into  one  fervent  ejaculation, 
"  So  I  prayed  to  the  God  of  heaven  ". 

(2)  Again,  one  whose  life  is  spent  in  fellowship  with  God 
will  constantly  seek  and  find  opportunities  for  swift  and  fre- 
quently-recurring approaches  to  the  throne  of  grace.  The  Apostles 
bring  every  duty  under  the  cross ;  at  the  name  of  Jesus  their 
loyal  souls  soar  heavenward  in  adoration  and  in  praise.  The 
early  Christians  never  met  without  invoking  a  benediction ;  they 
never  parted  without  prayer.  The  saints  of  the  Middle  Ages 
allowed  each  passing  incident  to  summon  them  to  intercession — 
the  shadow  on  the  dial,  the  church  bell,  the  flight  of  the  swallows, 
the  rising  of  the  sun,  the  falling  of  a  leaf. 

IF  The  covenant  which  Sir  Thomas  Browne  made  with  himself 
is  well  known,  but  one  may  venture  to  refer  to  it  once  more : 
"  To  pray  in  all  places  where  quietness  inviteth  ;  in  any  house, 
highway,  or  street ;  and  to  know  no  street  in  this  city  that  may 
not  witness  that  I  have  not  forgotten  God  and  my  Saviour  in  it ; 
and  that  no  parish  or  town  where  I  have  been  may  not  say  the 
like.  To  take  occasion  of  praying  upon  the  sight  of  any  church 
which  I  see,  or  pass  by,  as  I  ride  about.  To  pray  daily,  and 
particularly  for  my  sick  patients,  and  for  all  sick  people  under 
whose  care  soever.  And  at  the  entrance  into  the  house  of  the 
sick  to  say,  '  The  peace  and  the  mercy  of  God  be  upon  this  house  \ 
After  a  sermon  to  make  a  prayer  and  desire  a  blessing,  and  to 
pray  for  the  minister."  ^ 

1 D.  M.  Mclntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  36. 


4IO  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

2.  There  are  many,  to  whom  prolonged  stated  prayers  on  week 
days  are  impracticable,  who  might,  nevertheless,  in  spite  of  over- 
crowded and  overstrained  lives,  win  real  blessings,  not  for  in- 
dividuals only,  but  for  the  Church  and  for  the  world,  by  faithful 
and  frequent  prayer  of  this  kind.  Just  as  there  are  to  the  trained 
ear  of  a  scientific  investigator  far  more  sounds  in  the  world  than 
most  of  us  ever  hear,  so  to  a  Christian  trained  to  hold  intercourse 
with  God  "  the  whole  air  is  full  of  church  bells  ringing  us  to 
prayer  ". 

Stated  seasons,  stated  rules,  stated  forms  of  words  are  as 
necessary  to  start  us  in  the  art  of  praying  as  are  similar  things 
in  the  case  of  any  earthly  art  or  science  that  we  would  acquire. 
For  we  learn  to  read  from  an  alphabet,  and  to  write  from  a  copy, 
to  draw  from  a  model,  and  to  play  from  a  scale.  Nor  can  we 
ever  dispense  with  such  forms — speaking  of  the  individual,  and 
not  of  public  worship,  where  they  have  another  justification — 
till  they  have  created  in  us  a  habit  of  prayer :  while  most  men 
who  are  in  earnest  will  even  then  consider  their  continuance 
advisable,  to  sustain  the  habit  when  already  formed,  since  our 
power  of  independent  prayer  is  peculiarly  liable  to  fluctuate  with 
the  accidents  of  our  bodily  and  mental  organization.  But  at  the 
same  time,  the  more  real  our  formal  prayer  becomes,  the  less  can 
it  remain  merely  formal  It  inevitably  develops  into  ejaculatory 
prayer  :  prayer  darted  upward  arrow-like,  at  no  stated  time  or 
season,  in  no  stated  form  of  words,  but  whenever  our  impulse 
moves  us,  or  a  joy  or  sorrow  strikes  us,  or  a  crisis  calls  to  action, 
or  an  interval  to  thought.  And  as  this  kind  of  informal  prayer 
becomes  increasingly  habitual,  the  prayerful  character  is  slowly 
formed,  the  character  of  which  prayer  is  the  real  mainspring,  the 
first  necessity,  without  which  it  could  no  longer  exist,  and  whose 
entire  tone  and  temper  is  constituted  by  the  fact. 

IF  "  For  everything  there  is  a  season,  and  a  time  to  every  pur- 
pose under  the  heaven."  But  neither  days,  nor  hours,  nor  seasons, 
did  ever  come  amiss  to  faithful  prayer.  Short  passes,  quick 
ejections,  concise  forms  and  remembrances,  holy  breathings, 
prayers  like  little  posies,  may  be  sent  forth  without  number  on 
every  occasion,  and  God  will  note  them  in  His  book.  But  all 
that  have  a  care  to  walk  with  God  fill  their  vessels  more  largely 
as  soon  as  they  rise,  before  they  begin  the  work  of  the  day,  and 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         411 

before  they  lie  down  again  at  night :  which  is  to  observe  what 
the  Lord  appointed  in  the  Levitical  ministry,  a  morning  and  an 
evening  lamb  to  be  laid  upon  the  altar.  So  with  them  that  are 
not  stark  irreligious,  prayer  is  the  key  to  open  the  day,  and  the 
bolt  to  shut  in  the  night.^ 

IF  The  body  may  be  sound,  but  the  soul  can  never  be  sound 
and  healthy  that  prefers  temporal  to  eternal  things.  But  where 
the  love  of  eternal  things  exists,  this  kind  of  prayer  is  not  only 
easy  but  delightful.  We  are  told  that  the  brethren  in  Egypt  use 
frequent  prayers  that  are  brief  and  swiftly  ejaculated.  This  they 
prefer  to  slower  methods,  that  the  vigilant  and  elevated  attention 
80  necessary  in  prayer  may  not  be  dulled  or  dissipated.  In  this 
they  show  that  when  attention  cannot  be  sustained  it  ought  not 
to  be  deadened,  but  that  when  it  is  sustained  it  should  not  be 
readily  interrupted.  ^ 

3.  Our  fathers  used  to  speak  much  of  and  practise  this  "  ejacu- 
latory  "  prayer.  It  would  be  a  great  gain  to  all  of  us  if  we  could 
learn  again  the  method  and  practise  it.  Notice  one  or  two  ad- 
vantages which  will  follow  from  the  cultivation  of  ejaculatory 
prayer. 

(1)  By  the  frequent  entertainment  of  holy  thoughts,  the  heart 
will  he  preserved  from  many  formes  of  evil,  and,  as  we  say,  from 
a  good  deal  of  worse  company.  There  are  times  when  the  mind 
seems  ready  to  give  indiscriminate  admission  to  all  kinds  of  idle 
fancies — impossible  things,  that  never  can  be,  extravagant 
things,  that  are  never  likely  to  be,  sinful  things,  that  it  is  to  be 
hoped  never  will  be.  Now,  what  a  clear  gain  to  character  it  is, 
if  we  can  give  to  this  restless  activity  of  the  inner  man  a  sancti- 
fied direction,  if  we  can  manage  to  fill  up  the  small  gaps  and 
crevices  of  unoccupied  life  with  holy  thoughts,  redeeming  the 
time  which  would  otherwise  be  waste,  or  worse  than  waste,  for 
God,  and  the  soul,  and  heaven. 

(2)  Again,  it  will  be  a  benefit  of  this  holy  habit,  that  it  will 
spiritualize  the  experiences  of  com,mon  life.  It  must  surely  be 
a  recommendation  of  ejaculatory  prayer  that  it  will  hinder  no 
business,  consume  no  time,  interfere  with  no  prudent  and  needed 
preparations  for  ordinary  duty.  All  it  asks  is  to  be  allowed  to 
interlace,  with  the  rough,  hard,  deadening  detail  of  daily  engage- 

1  Jaremy  Taylor.  ^  St.  Augustine,  Epist.f  130  ad  Probam. 


412    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

ment,  a  thread  of  elevating  and  purifying  thought — to  lead  us, 
under  the  wear  and  worry  of  great  trifles,  always  to  take  the 
Angel  of  the  Divine  presence  with  us — to  make  us  write,  even  on 
the  bells  of  the  horses,  "  Holiness  unto  the  Lord  ".  It  is  a  great 
fault  among  us  that  we  keep  business  and  devotion  too  much 
apart.  The  duties  belonging  to  them  we  seem  to  think  must 
have  separate  times  and  separate  places  for  their  performance, 
— as  if  an  altar  could  not  be  set  up  at  the  place  of  the  receipt  of 
custom,  or  as  if  the  incense  which  ascends  from  the  plough,  or 
from  the  loom,  would  be  regarded  of  God  as  coming  from  a  strange 
fire.  Old  George  Herbert,  speaking  of  doing  everything  "  for  the 
Lord's  sake,"  says : — 

A  servant  with  this  clause 

Makes  drudgery  divine ; 
Who  sweeps  a  room  as  for  Thy  laws 

Makes  that  and  th'  action  fine. 

And  the  great  Sir  Matthew  Hale,  recommending  short  acts  of  de- 
votion in  the  midst  of  business,  observes,  "  This  is  the  great  art 
of  Christian  chemistry,  and  by  means  of  it  the  whole  course  of 
this  life  becomes  a  service  to  Almighty  God  and  an  uninterrupted 
state  of  religion  ". 

(3)  And  then,  lastly,  it  is  an  advantage  of  ejaculatory  prayer 
that  it  tends  to  keep  up  the  life  and  fervour  of  our  more  formal 
and  lengthened  exercises.  They  are  the  little  showers  that  swell 
the  grain,  the  frequent  droppings  that  wear  the  stone,  the  oft- 
paid  visits  that  bind  two  loving  hearts.  The  believer  who  loves 
Christ  thinks  it  too  long  a  time  to  go  from  morning  to  night 
without  a  sight  of  Him,  without  a  word  with  Him,  without  a 
look  towards  Him.  Such  long  intermissions  cause  him,  when  he 
meets  his  Lord  at  night,  to  meet  Him  as  a  stranger.  He  re- 
members that  plans,  schemes,  purposes,  have  been  resolved  on  in 
the  course  of  the  day,  and  the  best  Friend  has  not  been  consulted. 
And  he  is  conscious  of  a  coldness.  The  heart  comes  dead  to  its 
work — cannot  discharge  itself  of  the  day's  anxieties  and  cares. 
Now  if,  from  time  to  time  during  the  day,  thoughts  of  Christ  had 
been  allowed  to  mingle  with  these  anxieties,  there  would  have 
been,  in  the  evening  meeting  with  Christ,  no  strangeness,  and,  on 
the  face  of  the  throne,  no  cloud.     The  passing  from  business  to 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         413 

devotion  would  then  be  felt  to  be  but  the  passing  from  God  in 
the  world  to  God  in  the  closet.  We  have  changed  our  place,  but 
not  our  company.  We  have  only  to  put  fresh  fuel  on  a  fire  which 
has  never  gone  out.  And  thus  there  would  be  more  freshness  and 
life  in  our  retired  devotions,  because,  in  the  midst  of  all  the  hurry 
of  our  active  duties,  we  had  kept  up  that  pious  habit  of 
Nehemiah — "So  I  prayed  to  the  God  of  heaven". 

IT  In  company,  on  the  street,  in  the  railway  train,  in  the  bustle 
of  business,  amidst  the  solemn  fervours  of  his  preaching,  and  in 
the  very  torrent  of  his  own  quaint,  racy,  picturesque  talk  in 
social  life — in  short,  everywhere  and  in  all  things,  his  faith  went 
up  to  heaven  in  quick,  pointed,  battle-like  cries.  When  others 
were  preaching  we  have  often  heard  him  praying  thus, "  Help, 
Lord,  help  !     Give  the  blessing,  and  save  many  !  "  ^ 

IF  It  is  a  great  word  in  the  letter  to  the  Hebrews  which  de- 
clares that  we  "  may  find  grace  to  help  us  in  time  of  need  ".  I 
have  always  felt  that  I  should  like  to  discover  some  idiom  of  my 
own  language  which  would  gather  the  thought  of  the  Greek 
phrase,  and  I  am  not  sure  but  that  it  is  perfectly  done  by  saying 
that  the  message  declares  we  may  find  grace  to  help  us  "  in  the 
nick  of  time  ".  ^ 

IF  There  is  a  little  story  of  Samuel  Rutherford  which  has  been 
preserved  for  us  by  Robert  Wodrow,  the  untiring  chronicler  of 
the  sayings  and  doings  of  his  Covenanting  ancestors  ;  and  Wod- 
row got  it  from  James  Stirling,  minister  of  the  Barony  Parish  in 
Glasgow,  and  himself  a  contemporary  of  those  valiant  men  who 
were  out  for  years  in  the  sleet  and  hail.  Rutherford,  Stirling 
said,  had  a  particular  liking  for  one  of  his  brethren,  James  Guthrie, 
the  fearless  confessor  who  died  a  martyr's  death  at  the  Mercat 
Cross  of  Edinburgh  in  the  June  of  1661.  Once  he  was  staying 
for  a  short  time  in  the  manse  of  his  friend  ;  and  on  a  certain 
morning,  the  door  of  his  room  having  been  left  ajar,  the  maid- 
servant saw  him  walking  up  and  down  within  its  walls,  lost  in 
meditation  and  prayer.  She  overheard  three  petitions,  which  he 
spoke  out  audibly  and  with  much  earnestness.  They  came  from 
his  lips,  she  remarked,  with  an  interval  between  each  of  them,  as 
though  every  one  were  too  weighty  and  too  pregnant  to  be 
hurried  over.  -This  was  the  first,  Lord^  make  me  believe  in  Thee  ! 
There  was  a  pause.     He  sat  down,  and  mused,  and  rose  again ; 

^  J.  Macpherson,  Duncan  Matheson,  39. 

*  G.  Campbell  Morgan,  The  Practice  of  Prayer,  113. 


414    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

and  now  his  cry  was,  Lord^  make  me  love  Thee  !  Again  he  waited 
for  a  minute  or  two ;  and  by  and  by  the  entreaty  came,  Lord, 
make  me  keep  all  Thy  comm,andm,ent8  !  ^ 

III. 

Much  Time. 

1.  While  many  private  prayers,  in  the  nature  of  things,  must 
be  short ;  while  public  prayers,  as  a  rule,  ought  to  be  short  and 
condensed ;  while  there  is  ample  room  for  and  value  put  on 
ejaculatory  prayer — yet  in  our  private  communion  with  God 
time  is  a  feature  essential  to  its  value.  Much  time  spent  with 
God  is  the  secret  of  all  successful  praying.  Prayer  which  is  felt 
as  a  mighty  force  is  the  mediate  or  immediate  product  of  much 
time  spent  with  God.  Our  short  prayers  owe  their  point  and 
efficiency  to  the  long  ones  that  have  preceded  them.  The  short 
prevailing  prayer  cannot  be  prayed  by  one  who  has  not  prevailed 
with  God  in  a  mightier  struggle  of  long  continuance.  Jacob's 
victory  of  faith  could  not  have  been  gained  without  that  all-night 
wrestling.  Much  with  God  alone  is  the  secret  of  knowing  Him 
and  of  influence  with  Him.  There  can  be  no  converse  with  a  holy 
God,  no  fellowship  between  heaven  and  earth,  no  power  for  the 
salvation  of  the  souls  of  others,  unless  much  time  is  set  apart  for 
it.  Just  as  it  is  necessary  for  a  child  for  long  years  to  eat  and 
learn  every  day,  so  the  life  of  grace  depends  entirely  on  the  time 
men  are  willing  to  give  to  it  day  by  day. 

H  The  men  who  have  most  fully  illustrated  Christ  in  their 
character,  and  have  most  powerfully  affected  the  world  for  Him, 
have  been  men  who  spent  so  much  time  with  God  as  to  make  it 
a  notable  feature  of  their  lives.  Charles  Simeon  devoted  the 
hours  from  four  till  eight  in  the  morning  to  God.  Mr.  Wesley 
spent  two  hours  daily  in  prayer.  He  began  at  four  in  the  morn- 
ing. Of  him,  one  who  knew  him  well  wrote :  "  He  thought 
prayer  to  be  more  his  business  than  anything  else,  and  I  have 
seen  him  come  out  of  his  closet  with  a  serenity  of  face  next  to 
shining ".  John  Fletcher  stained  the  walls  of  his  room  by  the 
breath  of  his  prayers.  Sometimes  he  would  pray  all  night; 
always,  frequently,  and  with  great  earnestness.  His  whole  life 
was  a  life  of  prayer.  "  I  would  not  rise  from  my  seat,"  he  said, 
"  without  lifting  my  heart  to  God."      His  greeting  to  a  friend 

'  A.  Smellie,  The  Daily  Walk,  6. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         415 

was  always,  "  Do  I  meet  you  praying  ?  "  Luther  said  :  "  If  I  fail 
to  spend  two  hours  in  prayer  each  morning,  the  devil  gets  the 
victory  through  the  day.  I  have  so  much  business  I  cannot  get 
on  without  spending  three  hours  daily  in  prayer."  He  had  a 
motto  :  "  He  that  has  prayed  well  has  studied  well ". 

John  Welch,  the  holy  and  wonderful  Scotch  preacher,  thought 
the  day  ill  spent  if  he  did  not  spend  eight  or  ten  hours  in  prayer. 
He  kept  a  plaid  that  he  might  wrap  himself  when  he  arose  to 
pray  at  night.  His  wife  would  complain  when  she  found  him 
lying  on  the  ground  weeping.  He  would  reply  :  "  O  woman,  I 
have  the  souls  of  three  thousand  to  answer  for,  and  I  know  not 
how  it  is  with  many  of  them  ! "  ^ 

H  Bishop  Andrewes  was  a  busy  man,  and  yet  he  spent  five 
hours  a  day  in  devotion  !  Bishop  Dupanloup,  of  Orleans,  led  a 
very  active  life,  yet  he  spent  four  hours  a  day  in  devotion !  The 
late  Dean  of  Lincoln  (Dr.  Butler),  was  one  of  the  most  active  and 
incessant  workers  of  our  time,  yet  he  rose  every  morning,  summer 
and  winter,  for  fifty  years  at  six  o'clock,  for  the  purpose  of  secur- 
ing time  for  quiet  communion  with  God.  But  we  may  go  im- 
measurably higher  for  an  example.  We  may  look  at  our  Lord's 
life  of  unwearied  activity,  so  unwearied  that  at  times  He  and  His 
Apostles  "  had  no  leisure  so  much  as  to  eat ".  Well,  then,  consider 
such  texts  as  these  :  "  In  the  morning,  rising  up  a  great  while  be- 
fore day,  he  went  out,  and  departed  into  a  solitary  place,  and 
there  prayed".  "  He  withdrew  himself  into  the  wilderness,  and 
prayed."  Or  again,  "  He  continued  all  night  in  prayer  to  God" 
before  choosing  His  Apostles.  Or  again,  after  "  a  successful  day," 
after  the  feeding  of  the  five  thousand,  "  when  He  had  sent  the 
multitudes  away,  he  went  up  into  a  mountain  apart  to  pray  • 
and  when  the  evening  was  come,  he  was  there  alone."  ^ 

2.  Spiritual  work  is  taxing  work,  and  men  are  loath  to  do  it. 
Praying,  true  praying,  costs  an  outlay  of  serious  attention  and  of 
time  which  flesh  and  blood  do  not  relish.  Few  persons  are  made 
of  such  strong  fibre  that  they  will  make  a  costly  outlay  when 
surface  work  will  pass  as  well  in  the  market.  We  can  habituate 
ourselves  to  our  beggarly  praying  until  it  looks  well  to  us ;  at 
least  it  keeps  up  a  decent  form  and  quiets  conscience — the  dead- 
liest of  opiates  !  We  can  slight  our  praying,  and  not  realize  the 
peril  till  the  foundations  are  gone.    Hurried  devotions  make  weak 

^  E.  M.  Bounds,  Power  through  Prayer,  48. 

2  B.  W.  Randolph,  The  Threshold  of  t}ie  Sanctuary,  90. 


4i6    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

faith,  feeble  convictions,  questionable  piety.  To  be  little  with 
God  is  to  be  little  for  God.  To  cut  short  the  praying  makes  the 
whole  religious  character  short,  scrimp,  niggardly,  and  slovenly. 

IT  I  suspect  I  have  been  allotting  habitually  too  little 
time  to  religious  exercises  as  private  devotion,  religious  medita- 
tion, Scripture  reading,  etc.  Hence  I  am  lean  and  cold  and  hard- 
God  would  perhaps  prosper  me  more  in  spiritual  things  if  I  were 
to  be  more  diligent  in  using  the  means  of  grace.  I  had  better 
allot  more  time,  say  two  hours  or  an  hour  and  a  half,  to  religious 
exercises  daily,  and  try  whether  by  so  doing  I  cannot  preserve  a 
frame  of  spirit  more  habitually  devotional,  a  more  lively  sense  of 
unseen  things,  a  warmer  love  to  God,  and  a  greater  degree  of 
hunger  and  thirst  after  righteousness,  a  heart  less  prone  to  be 
soiled  with  worldly  cares,  designs,  passions,  and  apprehension, 
and  a  real  undissembled  longing  for  heaven,  its  pleasures  and  its 
purity.^ 

IV. 

Always. 

"  Men  ought  always  to  pray,  and  not  to  faint."  The  words 
are  the  words  of  our  Lord,  who  not  only  sought  ever  to  impress 
upon  His  followers  the  urgency  and  the  importance  of  prayer,  but 
set  them  an  example  which  they,  alas  !  have  been  far  too  slow  to 
copy.  How  is  it  to  be  done  ?  Not  easily  and  not  all  at  once. 
There  are  steps  in  the  process.  Says  William  Law :  "  The  pain- 
ful sense  and  feeling  of  what  you  are,  kindled  into  a  working 
State  of  Sensibility  by  the  Light  of  God  within  you,  is  the  Fire  and 
Light  from  whence  your  Spirit  of  Prayer  proceeds.  In  its  first 
kindling  nothing  is  found  or  felt  but  Pain,  Wrath,  and  Darkness, 
as  is  to  be  seen  in  the  first  kindling  of  every  Heat  or  Fire.  And 
therefore  its  first  prayer  is  nothing  else  but  a  sense  of  Penitence, 
Self-condemnation,  Confession,  and  Humility.  This  Prayer  of 
Humility  is  met  by  the  Divine  Love,  the  Mercifulness  of  God  em- 
braces it :  and  then  its  prayer  is  changed  into  Hymns  and  Songs 
and  Thanksgivings.  When  this  State  of  Fervour  has  done  its 
Work,  has  melted  away  all  earthly  Passions  and  Affections,  and 
left  no  Inclination  in  the  Soul,  but  to  delight  in  God  alone — then 
its  Prayer  changes  again.     It  is  now  come  so  near  to  God,  has 

^  William  Wilberforce. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         417 

found  such  Union  with  Him  that  it  does  not  so  much  pray  as  live 
in  God.  Its  Prayer  is  not  any  particular  action,  is  not  the  Work 
of  any  particular  faculty,  not  confined  to  Times,  or  Words,  or  Place, 
but  is  the  Work  of  his  whole  Being,  which  continually  stands  in 
Fulness  of  Faith,  in  Purity  of  Love,  in  absolute  Resignation,  to  do, 
and  be,  what  and  how  his  Beloved  pleases.  This  is  the  last  State 
of  the  Spirit  of  Prayer,  and  its  highest  Union  with  God  in  this 
Life." 

1.  The  always  speaks  for  itself.  Prayer  is  not  a  meaningless 
function  or  duty  to  be  crowded  into  the  busy  or  the  weary  ends 
of  the  day,  and  we  are  not  obeying  our  Lord's  command  when  we 
content  ourselves  with  a  few  minutes  upon  our  knees  in  the 
morning  rush  or  late  at  night  when  the  faculties,  tired  with  the 
tasks  of  the  day,  call  out  for  rest.  God  is  always  within  call,  it 
is  true ;  His  ear  is  ever  attentive  to  the  cry  of  His  child,  but  we 
can  never  come  to  know  Him  if  we  use  the  vehicle  of  prayer  as  we 
use  the  telephone — for  a  few  words  of  hurried  conversation.  In- 
timacy requires  development.  We  can  never  know  God,  as  it  is 
our  privilege  to  know  Him,  by  brief  and  fragmentary  and  un- 
considered repetitions  of  intercessions  that  are  requests  for  per- 
sonal favours  and  nothing  more.  That  is  not  the  way  in  which 
we  can  come  into  communication  with  heaven's  King.  "  The  goal 
of  prayer  is  the  ear  of  God,"  a  goal  that  can  be  reached  only  by 
patient  and  continued  and  continuous  waiting  upon  Him,  pouring 
out  our  heart  to  Him  and  permitting  Him  to  speak  to  us.  Only 
by  so  doing  can  we  expect  to  know  Him ;  and  as  we  come  to 
know  Him  better  we  shall  spend  more  time  in  His  presence  and 
find  that  presence  a  constant  and  ever-increasing  delight. 

IF  I  never  prayed  more  earnestly  nor  probably  with  such 
faithful  frequency.  "  Pray  without  ceasing "  has  been  the 
sentence  repeating  itself  in  the  silent  thought,  and  I  am  sure 
it  must  be  my  practice  till  the  last  conscious  hour  of  life.  Oh, 
why  not  throughout  that  long,  indolent,  inanimate  half -century 
past?i 

IF  It  is  in  this  sense  that  the  old  epigram  is  true,  Laborare 
est  orare.  Epigrams  are  dangerous  things  if  pressed  too  far, 
for  they  generally  express  only  one  element  of  truth.     So  it  is 

1  John  Foster. 
27 


4i8     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

here.  To  a  certain  extent  it  is  true  to  say  that  '*  work  is  prayer," 
but  no  more.  All  work  done  for  God's  glory  and  man's  good 
is  another  form  of  expression  of  this  attitude  of  mind  to  God, 
and  in  that  sense  it  is  prayer.  The  liturgy  and  the  work  are 
the  visible  outcome  of  the  same  state  of  mind  and  feeling.  Work 
and  prayer  have  a  common  factor,  but  neither  can  be  the  substi- 
tute for  the  other.  ^ 

I  am  content  to  live  the  patient  day : 

The  wind  sea-laden  loiters  to  the  land 

And  on  the  glittering  gold  of  naked  sand 
The  eternity  of  blue  sea  pales  to  spray. 
In  such  a  world  we  have  no  need  to  pray ; 

The  holy  voices  of  the  sea  and  air 

Are  sacramental,  like  a  mighty  prayer 
In  which  the  earth  has  dreamed  its  tears  away. 
We  row  across  the  waters'  fluent  gold 
And  age  seems  blessed,  for  the  world  is  old. 

Softly  we  take  from  Nature's  open  palm 

The  dower  of  the  sunset  and  the  sky. 

And  dream  an  Eastern  dream,  starred  by  the  cry 
Of  sea-birds  homing  through  the  mighty  calm.^ 

2.  Does  "  pray  without  ceasing  "  refer  to  continual  acts  of 
prayer,  in  which  we  are  to  persevere  till  we  obtain,  or  to  the 
spirit  of  prayerf ulness  that  should  animate  us  all  the  day  ?  It 
includes  both.  The  example  of  our  Lord  Jesus  shows  us  this. 
We  have  to  enter  our  closet  for  special  seasons  of  prayer ;  we  are 
at  times  to  persevere  there  in  importunate  prayer.  We  are  also 
all  the  day  to  walk  in  God's  presence,  with  the  whole  heart  set 
upon  heavenly  things.  Without  set  times  of  prayer  the  spirit 
of  prayer  will  be  dull  and  feeble.  Without  the  continual  prayer- 
fulness  the  set  times  will  not  avail. 

IF  The  steady  reading  of  a  chapter  of  the  Bible  in  the  morning 
and  evening,  and  at  least  the  deliberate  utterance  of  appointed 
prayer,  with  endeavour  to  fix  my  thoughts  upon  it  (often  success- 
ful— and  always  sincere),  gave  me  a  continually  increasing  know- 
ledge of  the  meaning  both  of  the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  and 
of  what  prayer  meant  for  Christians  of  old  time  :  farther  than  this, 
all  my  love  of  the  beauty,  or  sense  of  the  majesty,  of  natural 
things  was  in  direct  ratio  to  conditions  of  devotional  feeling ;  and 

^  T.  W.  Drury,  The  Prison-Ministry  of  St.  Paul,  114. 
*G.  Cabot  Lodge,  Poems  and  Dramas,  i.  66. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         419 

I  never  climbed  to  any  mountain,  alone,  without  kneeling  down, 
by  instinct,  on  its  summit  to  pray.^ 

IF  It  is  given  him  "  always  to  pray,  and  not  to  faint".  Not 
that  he  is  always  in  the  house  of  prayer,  though  he  neglects  no 
opportunity  of  being  there.  Neither  is  he  always  on  his  knees, 
although  he  often  is,  or  on  his  face,  before  the  Lord  his  God. 
Nor  yet  is  he  always  crying  aloud  to  God,  or  calling  upon  Him  in 
words  :  for  many  times  "  the  Spirit  maketh  intercession  for  him 
with  groans  that  cannot  be  uttered".  But  at  all  times  the 
language  of  his  heart  is  this :  "  Thou  brightness  of  the  eternal 
glory,  unto  Thee  is  my  heart,  though  without  a  voice,  and  my 
silence  speaketh  unto  Thee  ".  And  this  is  true  prayer,  and  this 
alone.  But  his  heart  is  ever  lifted  up  to  God,  at  all  times  and 
in  all  places.  In  this  he  is  never  hindered,  much  less  interrupted, 
by  any  person  or  thing.  In  retirement  or  company,  in  leisure, 
business,  or  conversation,  his  heart  is  ever  with  the  Lord. 
Whether  he  lie  down  or  rise  up,  God  is  in  all  his  thoughts; 
he  walks  with  God  continually,  having  the  loving  eye  of  his 
mind  still  fixed  upon  Him,  and  everywhere  "  seeing  him  that  is 
invisible  ".- 

![  Other  actions  hinder  one  another :  I  cannot  walk  and  sit 
down ;  I  cannot  build  and  write ;  I  cannot  travel  and  sleep. 
But  prayer,  as  logicians  say  of  substance,  nihil  habet  contrar- 
ium,  *'  hath  nothing  contrary  to  it,"  but  applies  itself  to  every- 
thing. I  may  walk  and  pray,  I  may  build  and  pray,  I  may 
write  and  pray.  And  St.  Jerome  will  tell  us,  Sanctis  etiam  ipse 
somnus  est  oratorio,  *'that  holy  men  do  pray  even  when  they 
sleep  ".^ 

3.  What  was  St.  Paul's  idea  of  unceasing  prayer  ?  There 
happens  to  be  a  passage  in  one  of  his  Epistles  in  which  he  seems 
to  have  hinted  at  it — in  which,  while  not  fully  explaining  himself, 
he  gives  us  at  least  a  clue  to  follow.  "  Praying  always,"  he  writes 
to  the  Ephesians,  '*  praying  always  with  all  prayer  and  supplica- 
tion in  the  spirit" — as  though  he  had  written,  *'  Whatever  you 
may  be  saying  or  doing,  however  head,  heart,  hands  may  be 
occupied,  be  praying  always  in  the  spirit  of  your  sayings  and 
doings,  in  your  pervading  temper  and  disposition,  in  your  central 
animating  principle  ".     Asking  God  and  worshipping  God  were 

1  Euskin,  Modem  Painters,  ii.  (Epilogue). 

2  John  Wesley,  Works,  viii.  343. 

3  Anthony  Fayindon,  Sermons,  iv.  218. 


420    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

regarded  by  him,  then,  as  the  utterance  at  intervals  of  a  certain 
spirit,  a  certain  spirit  which  might  be  otherwise  and  variously 
uttered  ;  and  to  live  in  that  spirit,  to  have  it  constantly  pulsing  and 
ruling  within  us,  would  be  his  idea  of  praying  without  ceasing. 

Now  this  spirit  which  constitutes  pray  erf  ulness,  and  which 
may  be,  and  should  be,  habitually  ours,  is  a  compound  of  three 
elements. 

(1)  First,  Aspiration.  In  all  true  praying  we  have  the  cry 
of  an  inward  hunger  for  better  being  and  doing.  It  means  a  soul 
looking  onward  and  upward  to  an  ideal  which,  seen  afar  off,  is 
yearned  after ;  it  means  a  soul  discontented  with  itself,  with  its 
present  attainments  and  performances,  unable  to  rest  in  things  as 
they  are,  and  craving  more  and  nobler.  "  Thy  kingdom  come. 
Thy  will  be  done  in  earth,  as  it  is  in  heaven."  There  is  the 
wistful  reaching  forth  towards  something  higher  and  more  perfect. 
Wherever,  then,  improvement  is  being  desired  and  sought  (not, 
of  course,  improvement  in  our  surroundings,  but  in  ourselves  ;  not 
of  course,  improvement  in  what  we  have,  but  in  what  we  are  and 
do),  there  is  prayer,  even  though  it  may  not  be  breaking  out  at 
the  time  in  any  cry  to  God,  since  there  is  the  very  same  spirit 
which  breathes  in  the  cry  of  prayer. 

^  You  know  the  picture  which  underlies  those  words  of  St. 
Paul — ''Not  reckoning  myself  yet  to  have  laid  hold,  I  press 
toward  the  mark  for  the  prize  of  my  high  calling," — the  picture, 
namely,  of  the  Greek  racer  in  his  agony  of  effort  and  hope,  as 
with  eye  fixed  on  the  distant  garland,  he  throws  himself  into  the 
struggle  to  win  it,  his  body  leaning  forward,  his  chest  heaving, 
every  muscle  strained,  every  vein  starting,  the  sweat-drops  beading 
his  brow.  That  might  stand  for  a  pictorial  representation  of 
prayer — he  is  ever  praying  in  the  spirit  who  is  ever  aspiring. 
Well,  here  is  a  man,  an  artisan  in  his  workshop,  or  an  artist  in 
his  studio,  engrossed  through  the  day,  from  morn  to  eve,  in  striv- 
ing to  realize  his  idea  of  what  would  be  fitting  and  fine ;  anxious 
to  overtake,  if  possible,  or  at  least  approach  nearer  than  yesterday, 
his  vision  of  the  truest  and  the  best,  in  surpassing  what  he  has 
hitherto  done — trying  to  succeed,  disappointed,  dissatisfied  with 
the  result,  and  trying  again,  altering,  rubbing  out,  touching,  and 
touching  anew,  intent  upon  executing  his  noblest,  until  the  night 
falls  ;  and,  "  behold,  he  prayeth,*'  and  has  been  praying  unpaus- 
ingly,  the  livelong  day.^ 

1  S.  A.  Tipple,  Sunday  Mornings  at  Norwood,  114. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         421 

(2)  And  again,  what  is  praying  but  the  utterance  Godward  of 
a  holy  and  benevolent  love — love  for  Divine  things  and  for  men  ? 
When  the  heart  withdraws  at  seasons  from  the  activities  and 
occupations  of  daily  life,  from  the  customary  round  of  work  and 
duty,  to  commune  with  the  beauty  of  the  Lord,  with  the  infinite 
perfection  of  the  All-Father,  and  to  make  request  of  Him  for 
light  and  guidance,  for  reinforcement  and  renewed  inspiration, 
what  is  it  but  the  uprising  and  forthgoing  of  the  heart's  love  for 
the  great  things  of  being,  for  those  realities  which,  while  most 
real  and  substantial,  most  precious  and  enduring,  may  have  but 
comparatively  Httle  charm  or  attraction  for  the  many  ?  Is  it  not 
affection  for  them,  temporarily  sighing  and  suing  at  the  feet  of 
God  ?  When,  then,  a  man  is  seen  devoted,  for  example,  to  the 
pursuit  of  worthy  knowledge,  pursuing  it  simply  and  sincerely 
for  its  own  sake,  caring  more  for  it  than  for  material  comforts, 
mere  worldly  success,  or  fulness  of  gold,  content,  and  willing  to 
deny  himself  for  it  in  some  respects,  and  finding  delight  in  the 
witnessed  progress  and  diffusion  of  such  knowledge  ;  when  a  man 
is  seen,  eager  in  search  and  inquiry  after  truth,  ready,  if  needful, 
to  follow  it  through  storms,  to  incur  trouble,  and  sufier  saci'ifice 
for  it ;  or  concerned  to  keep  a  good  conscience  rather  than  keep 
or  gain,  at  its  expense,  a  good  name ;  infinitely  more  solicitous  for 
honour  and  righteousness  than  for  pleasant  place  and  smooth 
circumstance,  giving  the  supremacy  always  to  moral  considerations, 
always  sympathizing  strongly  with  what  is  just  and  pure  and 
true — when  a  man  is  seen  living  thus,  is  he  not  exemplifying 
from  mom  to  eve  the  very  holy  love  of  prayer,  that  love  for  the 
best  things  of  which  all  real  prayer  is  the  expression  ?  There  it  is 
possessing  him  permanently,  and  in  being  permanently  possessed 
with  it,  he  prays  "  without  ceasing  ". 

But  who  really  prays  for  himself  alone  ?  Who  can  begin  to 
call  upon  the  great  Father  of  the  world,  to  enter  with  his  burdens 
into  the  presence  of  the  Eternal  Goodness,  and  not  begin  to  throb 
with  desire  for  others?  You  hear  the  prayers,  the  repeated 
prayers,  of  the  Church,  in  its  assembly,  "  for  all  sorts  and  condi- 
tions of  men,"  for  the  sick  in  their  chambers  and  the  workers  at 
their  toil,  for  them  that  struggle  and  them  that  weep,  for  the 
heavy  laden  and  the  weary ;  and  in  so  far  as  these  are  genuine 
prayers,  what  are  they  but  love  crying  ?     Let  love,  then,  be 


422    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

abiding  in  us,  a  spirit  prompting  to  kindly  thought  and  generous 
action,  to  unselfish  considerateness  and  timely  helpfulness,  ready 
always  to  offer  sympathy  and  afford  what  succours  it  can,  to  feel 
with  those  around  it  in  their  joys  and  griefs,  to  study  their 
interests  and  charge  itself  with  their  needs ;  a  spirit  of  willing- 
ness to  serve,  and  that  seeks  and  seizes  opportunities  of  serv- 
ing; let  such  love  be  abiding  in  us,  constraining  us  to  be  ever 
recognizing  duly,  and  answering  graciously,  the  appeals  to  us, 
that  may  lie  in  the  state  and  condition  of  others ;  and  are  we 
not  in  spirit  and  deed  praying  unceasingly,  in  spirit  and  deed, 
still  praying,  when  we  have  risen  from  our  knees,  and  though 
we  should  never  kneel  again  ? 

Abou  Ben  Adhem  (may  his  tribe  increase !) 

Awoke  one  night  from  a  deep  dream  of  peace, 

And  saw,  within  the  moonlight  in  his  room. 

Making  it  rich,  and  lily-like  in  bloom, 

An  angel  writing  in  a  book  of  gold  ; — 

Exceeding  peace  had  made  Ben  Adhem  bold. 

And  to  the  presence  in  the  room  he  said, 

"  What  writest  thou?  " — The  vision  raised  its  head, 

And  with  a  look  made  of  all  sweet  accord. 

Answer 'd,  "  The  names  of  those  who  love  the  Lord  ". 

"  And  is  mine  one  ? "  said  Abou.     "  Nay,  not  so," 

Replied  the  angel.     Abou  spoke  more  low, 

But  cheerly  still ;  and  said,  "  I  pray  thee  then. 

Write  me  as  one  that  loves  his  fellow-men  ". 

The  angel  wrote,  and  vanished.     The  next  night 
It  came  again  with  a  great  wakening  light. 
And  showed  the  names  whom  love  of  God  had  blessed, 
And  lo  !  Ben  Adhem's  name  led  all  the  rest.^ 

(3)  Then,  last  of  all,  all  true  praying  has  its  root,  has  it  not, 
in  trust,  and  means  trust.  If  it  be  anything,  it  is  the  casting  of 
the  soul  on  God  as  its  all — as  its  refuge  and  support — and  is  the 
outflow  of  the  soul's  confidence  that  He  is  mindful  of  us  and  cares 
for  us ;  that  the  world  is  under  His  government,  and  that  we  are 
His  children.  In  praying,  we  commit  ourselves  to  Him,  with  the 
faith  that  His  is  the  kingdom,  and  the  power,  and  the  glory  ; 
that  His  wisdom  and  goodness  are  ours,  in  exercise  for  us.     This 

*  Leigh  Hunt,  Abou  Ben  Adhem. 


THE  FIT  TIMES  FOR  PRAYER         423 

is  the  prayerfulness  in  spirit ;  for  prayer  is  trust,  trust  in  a  reign- 
ing rectitude  and  benevolence,  and  in  its  invisible  things ;  trust 
in  conscience,  and  in  moral  principle,  and  in  the  Kingdom  of  God ; 
and  he  who  is  thus  habitually  trustful, — able  with  tranquil  courage 
to  resign  himself  to  duty,  and  fearful  of  nothing  but  unfaithful- 
ness thereto — he,  prays  "  without  ceasing  ". 

If  we  with  earnest  effort  could  succeed 

To  make  our  life  one  long  connected  prayer. 

As  lives  of  some  perhaps  have  been  and  are. 

If  never  leaving  Thee,  we  had  no  need 

Our  wandering  spirits  back  again  to  lead 

Into  Thy  presence,  but  continued  there, 

Like  angels  standing  on  the  highest  stair 

Of  the  sapphire  throne,  this  were  to  pray  indeed. 

But  if  distractions  manifold  prevail. 

And  if  in  this  we  must  confess  we  fail. 

Grant  us  to  keep  at  least  a  prompt  desire. 

Continual  readiness  for  prayer  and  praise, 

An  altar  heaped  and  waiting  to  take  fire 

With  the  least  spark,  and  leap  into  a  blaze.^ 

1 R.  C.  Trench,  Poems,  141. 


XX. 

The  Mantner  of  Prayer. 


Literature. 

Augustine,  St.,  Short  Treatises  (Library  of  the  Fathers). 

,,  ,,     Confessions  (tr.  Montgomery,  1910). 

Balch,  A.  E.,  Prayer. 
Binnie,  W.,  Sermons  (1887). 

Bliss,  F.  J.,  The  Religions  of  Modern  Syria  (1912). 
Bowne,  B.  P.,  The  Essence  of  Religion  (1911). 
Church,  R,  W.,  Village  Sermons^  ii.  (1894). 
Clapperton,  J.  A.,  Culture  of  the  Christian  Heart  (1911). 
Diggle,  J.  W.,  Sermons  for  Daily  Life  (1891). 
Donaldson,  S.  A.,  The  Church  in  North  Africa  (1909). 
Everett,  C.  C. ,  Theism  and  the  Christian  Faith  (1909). 
Ewing,  J.  W.,  The  Undying  Christ. 
Grenfell,  W.  T.,  Immortality  (1913). 
Horton,  R.  F.,  The  Open  Secret  (1904). 
James,  J.  G.,  The  Prayer  Life. 

L3rttelton,  P].,  Studies  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  (1906). 
McCormick,  C.  W.,  The  HeaH  of  Prayer  (1913). 
McFadyen,  J.  E.,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible  (1906). 
Mclntyre,  D.  M.,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer  (1906). 
Martensen,  H.,  Christian  EthicSy  i.  (1881). 
Moule,  H.  C.  G.,  All  in  Christ  (1901). 
Newman,  J.  H.,  Parochial  and  Plain  Sermons^  i.  (1868). 
Rashdall,  H.,  Christus  in  Ecclesia  (1904). 
Ullathorne,  W.  B.,  Christian  Patience  (1886). 
Walpole,  G.  H.  S.,  Prayer  and  Communion  (1912). 
Wilson,  T.,  In  His  Name  (1913). 
American  Journal  of  Psychology y  ii.  (1906)  117  (F.  O.  Beck). 


426 


The  Manner  of  Prayer. 

He  understands  little  of  the  psychology  of  the  Christian  life 
who  does  not  know  that  attitude  and  language  may  greatly  help 
him  who  would  really  pray.  Certain  physical  habitudes  have 
been  associated  with  our  holiest  aspirations  and  expectations ; 
certain  words,  whether  of  Holy  Writ,  of  ancient  liturgy,  or  of 
individual  choice  often  repeated,  have  voiced  the  soul's  desire  and 
uttered  its  praise.  It  is  easier  to  pray  kneeling  in  the  familiar 
places  and  often  in  the  very  words  made  precious  by  frequent  use ; 
that  is,  if  the  real  spirit  of  prayer  is  present.  The  danger  is  that 
these  purely  external  conditions  shall  be  given  too  large  a  place. 
They  are  not  prayer  at  all.  They  are  no  necessary  part  of 
prayer.  If  they  tend  to  formality  or  indifference,  they  hinder 
prayer.  Prayer  is  at  heart  something  spiritual.  It  is  the 
longing  contact  of  the  spirit  of  man  with  the  Spirit  of  his 
Maker. 

Four  of  these  "purely  external  "  conditions  remain  for  brief 
treatment.     They  are  : — 
I.  The  Posture  in  Prayer. 
II.  Form  or  Freedom  in  Prayer. 

III.  The  Length  of  Prayer. 

IV.  The  Voice  in  Prayer. 


The  Posture. 

1.  The  familiar  postures  and  positions  of  prayer  are  valuable 
not  so  much  for  their  importance  to  God  as  for  the  aids  which 
they  give  to  us,  or  for  the  testimony  which  they  bear  to  others ; 
and  they  are  to  be  insisted  on  only  so  far  as  they  maintain  and 
quicken  the  devotion  in  ourselves,  or  are  necessary  to  make  the 
requisite  confession  to  the  world. 

427 


428    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

IF  In  Essex,  in  the  year  1550,  a  number  of  religious  persons 
who  had  received  the  Word  of  God  as  their  only  rule  of  faith  and 
conduct,  and  who  therefore  differed  in  certain  particulars  from  the 
dominant  party  in  the  Church,  met  to  confer  on  the  ordering  of 
worship.  The  chief  point  in  debate  related  to  the  attitude  which 
one  ought  to  observe  in  prayer — whether  it  were  better  to 
stand  or  kneel,  to  have  the  head  covered  or  uncovered.  The 
decision  arrived  at  was  that  the  material  question  had  reference 
not  to  the  bodily  posture,  but  to  the  direction  of  the  mind.  It 
was  agreed  that  that  attitude  is  most  seemly  which  most  fitly 
expresses  the  desires  and  emotions  of  the  soul.^ 

2.  Scripture  is  exceedingly  abstinent  in  legislation  about  the 
external  circumstances  of  God's  worship.  Often  as  the  subject 
of  prayer  comes  up,  and  copious  as  the  sacred  writers  are  regard- 
ing the  duty  and  privilege  and  due  manner  of  prayer,  there  is  an 
almost  entire  absence  of  authoritative  directions  regarding  its  ex- 
ternal accompaniments.  Accordingly,  you  will  find  no  absolute 
rule  laid  down  anywhere  in  Scripture  regarding  the  right  posture 
in  prayer.  The  point  is  not  utterly  trivial ;  prayer  is  such  a 
vital  element  in  the  Divine  life  that  nothing  relating  to  it  can  be 
absolutely  without  importance.  Doubtless  one  posture  is  more 
favourable  to  a  right  frame  of  mind  in  prayer  than  another. 
Yet  not  one  word  is  said  on  the  subject  in  Scripture  in  the  way  of 
authoritative  prescription.  God  has  laid  down  no  inflexible  rule ; 
no  doubt  for  this  very  good  reason,  that  the  posture  should  vary 
according  to  varying  circumstances.  There  is  a  time  to  pray 
standing ;  there  is  a  time  to  pray  sitting ;  there  is  a  time  to 
pray  kneeling;  there  is  even  a  time  to  pray  reclining,  for  we 
know  that  many  an  acceptable  prayer  has  gone  up  to  heaven 
from  the  invalid's  couch. 

The  posture  most  frequently  mentioned  in  Scripture  in  con- 
nexion with  prayer  is  prostration.  The  worshipper  approached 
God  with  the  same  deference  as  he  showed  when  presenting  a 
petition  to  an  earthly  superior.  Unfortunately  the  Hebrew 
equivalent  for  "  he  prostrated  himself  "  is  usually  rendered  in  the 
English  Bible  by  "he  worshipped".  The  prostration,  with  the 
face  to  the  ground,  was  commonly  preceded  by  the  bowing  of  the 
head,  and  it  is  sometimes  described  as  a  falling  to  the  earth  upon 

» D.  M.  Molntyre,  The  Hidden  Life  of  Prayer,  61. 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  429 

the  face.  Thus  Ezekiel  fell  on  his  face  when  he  saw  the  glory  of 
Jehovah  in  the  plain,  and  in  this  attitude  he  offered  his  brief 
intercessory  prayers.  Jesus,  too,  falls  on  His  face  in  Gethsemane, 
and  it  is  thus  that  the  angels  in  the  Apocalypse  (Rev.  vii.  2)  offer 
their  praise  to  God.  It  is  adopted  in  prayers  of  gratitude  as  well 
as  of  supplication.  A  very  peculiar  posture  is  that  of  Elijah, 
who,  on  Mount  Carmel,  put  his  head  between  his  knees.  The 
context  suggests  that  this  may  have  been  the  attitude  of  one  who 
prayed  for  rain. 

Prayer  could  also  be  offered  kneeling.  In  point  of  fact  most 
references  to  kneeling  appear  to  belong  to  the  later  books. 
Daniel,  Stephen,  Peter,  Paul  knelt :  these  prayers  are  all  petitions 
or  intercessions. 

Sometimes,  however,  the  worshipper  stood.  It  was  standing 
that  Hannah  prayed  for  a  son,  that  Solomon  blessed  the  people, 
and  that  Jeremiah  interceded  for  them.  The  "  hypocrites  "  in 
Jesus'  time  stood  at  prayer,  but  He  presupposes  the  same  attitude 
for  His  own  disciples.  The  Pharisee  offered  his  prayer  of  grati- 
tude standing ;  so  also  did  the  publican  his  for  mercy ;  and  in 
Revelation  vii.  10,  a  great  multitude  in  heaven  stands  to  praise 
God.  Thus  this  attitude  could  be  adopted  alike  in  prayers  of  peti- 
tion, of  intercession,  and  of  thanksgiving.  It  has  been  suggested, 
with  some  probability,  that  ordinarily  prayer  was  offered  kneel- 
ing or  standing,  with  prostration  at  the  beginning  and  the  end. 

Sitting  does  not  seem  to  be  a  particularly  natural  attitude  in 
prayer  :  but  it  occurs  at  least  once,  in  David's  prayer  of  gratitude, 
and  possibly  another  time,  in  a  context  of  sorrow. 

IF  Kneeling  is  the  attitude  of  humility,  of  confession,  of  en- 
treaty, of  worship.  Some  have  gone  further,  and  thought  that 
kneeling  in  prayer  is  a  symbol  of  man's  fallen  state,  that  he  can 
no  longer  stand  erect  before  God,  but  is  broken  and  crushed  in 
the  presence  of  Jehovah.  Certainly  kneeling  is  the  natural 
position  of  man  before  the  Almighty  and  All-Holy  Creator.  So 
the  holiest  and  highest  of  men  have  approached  God.  Solomon, 
the  greatest,  except  David,  of  all  Jewish  kings,  upon  the  day  of 
the  dedication  of  the  Temple,  knelt  down  before  all  his  people 
and  presented  his  prayer  to  God.  Ezra,  the  priest,  on  receiving 
news  of  the  people's  sin,  tells  us  :  "I  fell  upon  my  knees,  and 
spread  out  my  hands  unto  the  Lord  my  God ".  Daniel,  the 
prophet,  when,  in  the  city  of  idolatry,  he  heard  of  the  decree  for- 


430    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

bidding  prayer,  except  to  the  king,  for  thirty  days,  went  into 
his  house  and  "  kneeled  upon  his  knees  "  as  before.^ 

3.  In  the  early  Church  to  pray  kneeling  was  associated  with 
humiliation,  penance,  and  fasting ;  and  so  we  find  that,  during 
the  joyous  season  between  Easter  and  Whitsuntide,  not  only  were 
the  regular  fasts — on  Wednesdays  and  Fridays — not  observed, 
but  also  prayers  were  said  standing.  The  same  difference  in  the 
attitude  of  those  praying  was  also  made  on  Sundays,  and  Tertul- 
lian  speaks  of  "  some  few  "  who  abstained  from  kneeling  on 
Saturdays  also,  the  Jewish  Sabbath.  "  As  to  kneeling  in  prayer 
different  customs  are  permissible.  There  are  some  few  who  do 
not  kneel  on  the  Sabbath  (Saturday).  .  .  .  We,  however,  as  we 
have  been  taught,  on  the  day  of  the  Lord's  Resurrection  only, 
ought  to  be  free  not  merely  from  the  humiliation  of  kneeling,  but 
also  from  all  that  entails  anxiety  and  all  serious  duties,  putting 
off  even  our  business  for  fear  we  should  give  place  to  the  devil. 
The  same  also  applies  to  the  interval  between  Easter  and  Whit- 
suntide, which  we  mark  with  the  like  solemn  exultation."  So, 
"  on  the  Lord's  Day  we  consider  it  wrong  to  fast,  or  to  pray  on 
our  knees.  We  enjoy  this  same  liberty,  from  the  day  of  the 
Passover  right  on  to  Pentecost."  On  the  other  hand,  kneeling  is 
customary  at  other  times,  at  early  morning  prayers,  on  fast  days 
and  "  station  days  ". 

H  No  matter  when  or  where  it  is  uttered,  the  Moslem  formula 
of  prayer  is  unvarying.  The  prescribed  series  of  positions — 
standing,  bowing,  kneeling,  with  the  head  at  times  bent  to  the 
earth  and  the  hands  in  various  positions  :  hanging  at  the  side, 
folded  on  the  stomach,  stretched  out  from  the  lobes  of  the  ears, 
touching  the  knees,  or  spread  on  the  earth — these  positions,  with 
the  accompanying  ejaculations  and  quotations  from  the  Koran 
constitute  a  rak'ah,  or  prostration.- 

IT  Bishop  Latimer,  the  martyr,  towards  the  end  of  his  life  used 
to  spend  so  much  time  kneeling  in  prayer  that  he  had  to  be 
assisted  to  rise.  He  forgot  his  troubles  when  pouring  out  his 
soul  before  God.^ 

1  J.  W.  Ewing,  The  Undying  Christ,  70. 

2  F.  J.  Bliss,  The  Religio7is  of  Modern  Syria,  201. 

3  J.  W.  Ewing,  The  Undying  Christ,  71. 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  431 

4.  Yet  the  idea  that  we  can  pray  only  when  kneeling  is  one  of 
the  things  that  hinder  us  in  prayer.  Many  would  probably  spend 
a  much  longer  time  in  communion  with  our  Lord  than  they  do  if 
they  could  bring  themselves  to  believe  that  standing,  walking, 
sitting,  and  even  lying  down  may  be  attitudes  of  prayer.  All 
are  brought  under  the  Apostle's  injunction  that  we  should  "  pray 
without  ceasing  ".  It  is  much  to  be  wished  that  the  same  variety 
of  posture  should  be  employed  in  private  as  in  public,  that  so  we 
might  learn  not  only  to  make  the  half-hour  or  horn*  spent  with 
Him  as  restful  as  possible,  but  to  associate  with  Him  every 
attitude  that  we  adopt. 

H  In  prayer  to  God,  men  do  with  the  members  of  their  bodies 
that  which  becometh  suppliants,  when  they  bend  their  knees, 
when  they  stretch  forth  their  hands,  or  even  prostrate  themselves 
on  the  ground,  and  whatever  else  they  visibly  do,  albeit  their 
invisible  will  and  hearts'  intention  be  known  unto  God,  and  He 
needs  not  these  tokens  that  any  man's  mind  should  be  opened 
unto  Him  :  only  hereby  one  more  excites  himself  to  pray  and 
groan  more  humbly  and  more  fervently.  And  I  know  not  how 
it  is,  while  these  motions  of  the  body  cannot  be  made  but  by  a 
motion  of  the  mind  preceding,  yet  by  the  same  being  outwardly 
in  visible  sort  made,  that  inward  invisible  one  which  made  them 
is  increased  :  and  thereby  the  heart's  affection  which  preceded 
that  they  might  be  made,  groweth  because  they  are  made.  But 
still  if  any  be  in  that  way  held,  or  even  bound,  that  he  is  not  able 
to  do  these  things  with  his  limbs,  it  does  not  follow  that  the 
inner  man  does  not  pray,  and  before  the  eyes  of  God  in  its  most 
secret  chamber,  where  it  hath  compunction,  cast  itself  on  the 
ground.^ 

IT  I  very  seldom  venture  to  kneel  at  prayer  in  secret.  At 
night  it  leads  almost  invariably,  and  very  speedily,  to  sleeping  on 
my  knees,  and  even  in  the  morning  hour,  I  know  not  how,  recol- 
lectedness  and  concentration  of  heart  and  mind  are  usually 
quickened  in  my  case  by  a  reverent  standing  attitude  as  before 
the  visible  Master  and  Lord,  or  by  walking  up  and  down,  either 
in-doors  or,  as  I  love  to  do  when  possible,  in  the  open  air.  A 
garden  may  prove  a  very  truly  hallowed  oratory.^ 

IT  In  answer  to  questions  sent  to  many  persons  requesting  to 
know  their  habits  in  prayer,  one  answers  :  "  In  my  secret  prayer 
I  always  sit  (I  am  unable  to  kneel),  but  I  sit  with  my  face  turned 

1  St.  Augustine.  '-'  Bishop  Moule,  All  in  Christ,  82. 


432     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

heavenward  and  often  hold  my  hands  above  my  head  ".  Another 
answers :  "  Frequently  walking  is  most  effective.  Kneeling  is 
probably  more  habitual  in  times  of  relaxing ;  walking,  when  any 
intense  personal  problems  are  to  be  worked  out.  In  morning, 
sitting  or  walking  is  perhaps  more  indulged  in  ;  at  evening, 
kneeling."^ 

II. 

Form  or  Freedom. 

Should  prayer  be  liturgical  or  extempore  ?  In  public  prayer 
the  argument  is  strongest  for  liturgical,  in  private  prayer  for 
extempore.  But  it  is  a  striking  and  encouraging  fact  that  those 
who  use  the  one  form  or  the  other  are  invariably  (in  the  books 
we  have  read)  advocates  for  that  particular  form. 

"  There  are  times,"  says  Dean  Church, "  when  it  is  the  natural 
thing  to  pour  out  our  desires  and  feelings  in  prayer  that  rises 
fresh  to  our  lips  for  the  moment — in  extempore,  unprepared 
prayer.  But  these  are  not  the  times  of  regular,  stated,  public 
worship  as  they  come  Sunday  after  Sunday  in  God's  house. 
Extempore  prayer  is  for  extraordinary  occasions,  and  these  Sunday 
services  are  ordinary  ones — one  much  like  another — with  nothing 
special  to  call  for  it.  For  such  common  prayer  it  is  far  better 
that  people  should  know  the  words  of  their  prayers  and  be  familiar 
with  them  ;  that  they  should  not  be  distracting  their  attention  by 
asking  themselves  what  sort  of  things  the  minister  will  pray  for, 
and  how  he  will  frame  his  words  ;  but  that — knowing  the  words 
— their  thoughts  should  be  fixed  on  the  things  to  be  prayed  for. 
That  is  the  reason  why  we  think  it  so  much  wiser  and  better 
and  more  sober,  and  not  only  this,  but  really  more  spiritual,  to 
pray  out  of  a  book,  because  then  we  may  be  sure  of  having  the 
most  beautiful  and  most  spiritual  words  to  pray  in — words  in 
which  the  faith,  and  hope,  and  petitions  of  generations  of  holy 
souls  before  us  have  gone  up  to  God — prayers  fittingly  chosen 
for  us  by  men  who  were  themselves  deeply  filled  with  the  Spirit 
of  God."  2 

How  delicately  reserved  and  how  comprehensive  and  sugges- 

1 F.  O.  Beck,  in  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  ii.  117. 
2  Dean  Church,  Village  Sermons,  ii.  280. 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  433 

live  such  a  mode  of  social  prayer  may  be,  we  see  in  the  place 
which  the  Anglican  liturgy  holds  in  the  affections  of  a  large  pro- 
portion of  English  Christians.  How  these  words  of  common 
prayer  become  saturated  with  associations  and  meaning  as  years 
go  by  !  But  to  limit  united  prayer  to  such  set  forms  has  its  peril 
of  formality  and  deadness.  Life  is  so  various,  so  changeful,  that 
no  form  of  words  can  adequately  cover  its  needs.  Its  perfection 
leads  to  the  imperfection  of  indefiniteness,  unless  supplemented 
by  the  spontaneous  expression  of  immediate  necessity.  There  is 
no  higher  cultivation  of  heart  and  mind  than  such  unaffected  and 
spontaneous  communion.  Is  there  any  attitude  more  difficult  to 
maintain,  or  more  fraught  with  benefit  to  our  character,  than 
fellowship  in  prayer  ?  New  thoughts  arise,  forgotten  truths 
shine  with  unusual  beauty.  Overlooked  deficiencies  in  ourselves 
are  revealed  by  the  unconscious  revelation  of  grace  in  another, 
our  emotions  are  deepened  and  strengthened.  At  a  word  the 
flood-gates  of  pent-up  feeling  are  opened  in  loftiest  aspirations. 
Seeds  from  another  garden  of  the  soul  find  place  in  our  own. 
Sparks  may  kindle  our  enthusiasm  from  the  fire  of  another's  zeal. 
Even  the  difficulties  of  such  fellowship  increase  our  power  of 
self-suppression,  the  delicacy  of  our  sympathy,  and  the  patience 
of  affection.  We  lose  our  narrow  self -consciousness  in  proportion 
to  the  simplicity  and  reality  of  such  an  exercise. 

Whether  the  prayer  of  public  worship  takes  the  form  pre- 
scribed by  some  ritual,  or  is  extempore,  will  depend  upon  the 
preference  of  individual  minds.  The  liturgical  prayer  is  more 
universal,  the  extempore  prayer  more  particular ;  liturgical  forms 
tend  to  develop  a  general  religious  sense,  the  extempore  prayer 
tends  rather  to  call  forth  intensity  of  feeling  in  a  few. 

IF  Forms  of  prayer  can  help  us  to  think  towards  God.  If  they 
send  our  mind  to  sleep — and  they  sometimes  do  that — we  had 
better  put  them  on  one  side.  But  if  you  persist  in  thinking  out 
the  grand  petitions  found  in  many  prayer-books,  you  will  find 
that  they  stimulate  heavenly  thoughts.  Dr.  Jowett  tells  us  with 
great  beauty  that  printed  and  written  and  repeated  prayers  are 
useful  to  the  mind  when  it  is  barren,  but  ''when  the  form  has 
done  its  work,  drop  it.  A  form  is  a  tug-boat  to  get  out  to  the 
deep ;  when  you  are  there,  fish  for  yourselves."  ^ 

^  J.  A.  Clapperton,  Culture  of  the  Christian  Heart,  14. 
28 


434    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

i.  Extempore  Prayer. 

1.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  free  prayer  is,  on  the  whole, 
more  consonant  with  the  idea  of  prayer  than  fixed.  If  prayer  be 
a  real  intercourse  of  the  human  heart  with  God,  prescribed  or 
studied  words  would  seem  to  be  no  more  natural  than  in  inter- 
course with  men ;  and,  as  Dr.  Rainsf ord  has  said,  "  If  all  men 
prayed  always  as  some  men  pray  sometimes,  there  would  be  no 
need  of  a  liturgy".  In  particular,  it  might  be  argued  that  the 
true  Protestant  not  only  feels  the  impulse,  but  is  under  the  ob- 
ligation, to  pray  in  his  own  words.  Just  as  he  claims  the  right 
and  the  duty  to  think  for  himself,  so  it  might  be  said  that  he  has 
a  similar  right  and  duty  to  express  his  thoughts,  to  God  no  less 
than  to  man,  in  his  own  way.  But  the  retort  would  be  easy. 
The  Protestant,  if  he  be  an  educated  man,  does  not,  in  his  think- 
ing, ignore  the  thoughts  of  other  men.  He  is  not,  and  could  not 
be  if  he  would,  an  absolutely  independent  worker.  He  builds 
upon  the  labours  of  others,  welcomes  the  help  of  all  who  have 
done  or  are  doing  work  similar  to  his  own.  His  independence  is 
not  absolute,  but  relative ;  it  is  the  independence  of  a  man  who 
stands  in  human  society,  a  debtor  to  the  present,  and  a  very 
heavy  debtor  to  the  past.  Even  his  independence,  though  in  a 
sense  his  birthright,  was  historically  won  for  him.  He  can  never 
rid  himself  of  the  obligation  to  learn  from  others,  and  his  life 
would  be  infinitely  the  poorer  if  he  could.  This  indeed  would 
not  be  an  argument  for  the  use  of  fixed  forms,  but  it  would  be 
an  argument  for  the  study  of  the  best  devotional  literature  that 
the  world  has  produced ;  and  even  those  who  insist  most 
vehemently  on  the  duty  of  free  prayer  confess,  by  their  frequent 
use  of  the  Lord's  Prayer,  sometimes  also  by  the  abundance  of 
Scripture  quotations  with  which  they  embellish  their  own  prayers, 
their  enormous  debt  to  the  Bible. 

2.  The  prayer  which  we  call  extempore  is  seldom  really  ex- 
tempore. It  is  like  many  a  so-called  extempore  speech,  carefully 
prepared  beforehand,  and  probably  in  the  case  of  most  consci- 
entious ministers  the  thought  to  be  expressed  has  at  least  been 
considered.  In  this  respect  the  man  who  prays  is  like  the  true 
orator  who,  in  the  words  of  a  French  writer,  "  knows  what 
he  will  say,  but  does  not  know  how  he  will  say  it" ;  and  this 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  435 

is  perhaps  the  ideal  of  free  prayer.  So  the  contrast  between 
what  is  commonly  called  free  and  liturgical  prayer  is  nothing  like 
so  absolute  as  is  usually  supposed.  There  would  be  a  real  con- 
trast between  liturgical  prayer  and  a  prayer  which  the  speaker, 
without  the  least  premeditation,  uttered  in  immediate  dependence 
upon  the  inspiration  of  the  Spirit. 

3.  If  extempore  prayer  has  its  difficulties  and  dangers,  no  less 
has  liturgical  prayer.  It  was  instituted  partly  in  the  interests  of 
form ;  and  form  very  easily  becomes  formality.  Where  there  is 
little  variety  in  the  service,  and  the  same  words  are  repeated 
week  after  week,  the  spirit  may  easily  grow  insensible  to  their 
meaning.  Here,  more  than  anywhere  else,  the  letter  can  kill. 
Custom  can  make  fools  of  us  all.  The  noble  prayers  may  be 
babbled  instead  of  being  prayed,  and  their  spiritual  effect  upon 
leader  and  people  may  be  no  more  than  would  be  secured  by  a 
Tibetan  praying  machine,  moved  by  wind  or  water.  This 
danger  may  be  partly  obviated  by  variety  in  the  liturgy,  and  by 
giving  the  congregation  a  greater  part  in  the  service  ;  but  it  comes 
back  to  this,  that  a  prayer,  whether  free  or  fixed,  as  it  is  a 
deliberate  appeal  to  God,  must  always  be  regarded  as  one  of  the 
most  solemn  and  responsible  acts  of  the  religious  life,  and  has 
therefore  ever  to  be  entered  upon  with  a  sincerity  which  custom 
must  not  be  allowed  to  dull.  Probably  the  spiritual  effort  neces- 
sary to  interpret  feelingly  a  familiar  liturgical  prayer  is  greater 
than  that  needed  to  offer  an  extempore  prayer. 

^  The  use  of  the  Lord's  Prayer  by  no  means  excludes  but 
rather  involves  that  we  also  pray  with  our  own  words  ;  or  that 
the  prayer  delivered  to  us  by  the  Lord  or  the  Church  be  indi- 
vidualized in  us,  corresponding  to  our  special  states  and  relations. 
The  more  inward  prayer  becomes,  the  more  it  becomes  a  matter 
of  conscience,  the  more  will  individual  self-knowledge,  the  per- 
sonal consciousness  and  confession  of  sin,  be  manifested  in  prayer, 
while  we  not  only  in  general  confess  our  sinfulness  before  God's 
face,  but  also  our  own  special  sin,  our  special  temptations,  our 
special  hindrances ;  while  we  likewise  in  prayer  desire  to  learn 
what  the  special  will  of  God  is  with  us,  as  well  regarding  our 
inner  life  as  our  external  life  relations,  and  we  for  the  one  as  for 
the  other  desire  His  blessing.  With  an  entirely  peculiar  impor- 
tance this  individualizing  prayer  comes  forth  in  the  turning- 


436    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

points  of  life,  in  the  crises  of  being,  at  great  decisions  ;  and  if 
we  would  here  have  great  examples,  we  may  mention  Luther, 
in  the  ardent,  decisive  struggles  of  whose  life  prayer  so  often 
poured  forth  from  the  inmost  of  his  unique  personality,  although 
always  on  the  foundation  of  the  Lord's  Prayer  and  His  promises.^ 

IF  He  never  "  read  prayers,"  he  prayed.  He  poured  forth  the 
words  of  the  Church  service  as  the  expression  of  his  own  deepest 
thoughts  and  aspirations.  He  was  manifestly  conscious  the  whole 
time  that  he  was  leading  the  prayers  of  a  congi'egation,  otherwise 
his  whole  manner  and  voice  showed  that  he  was  completely  ab- 
sorbed in  the  actual  communion  of  thought  with  the  Unseen.^ 

ii.  Liturgical  Prayer. 
1.  The  advantages  of  fixed  prayer  at  public  worship  a^re  ob- 
vious. Greatest  of  all,  perhaps,  is  the  sense  which  it  brings — if  the 
prayers  are  ancient — of  continuity  with  the  past,  and  with  the 
present  Church  of  Christ  throughout  the  world.  We  pray  to  our 
Father ;  and  the  feeling  of  continuity  and  solidarity  would  un- 
doubtedly be  strengthened  if,  at  least  in  certain  parts  of  public 
worship,  the  same  prayers  persisted  throughout  the  ages  and 
across  the  world.  Religion  has  a  past  as  well  as  a  present,  and 
no  reverent  man  would  wish  to  cut  himself  off  from  that.  Rather 
would  he  wish  to  do  everything  that  was  not  inimical  to  his 
spiritual  welfare,  to  encourage  his  sense  of  fellowship  with  his 
ancient  and  distant  brethren  in  Christ.  The  Holy  Catholic 
Church  would  be  even  more  impressive  to  the  imagination,  if  she 
raised  her  prayers  and  petitions  to  God  not  only  with  united  heart 
but  also  with  united  voice.  Besides,  religion,  though  it  is  crea- 
tive, is  also,  in  the  deepest  sense,  conservative.  It  has  to  do  with 
the  things  that  abide,  the  needs  and  the  hopes  of  men,  which  are 
ever  the  same ;  and  if  a  worthy  expression  has  been  found  for 
these  things — simple,  true,  and  beautiful — why  may  it,  too,  not 
be  suffered  to  abide,  especially  as  it  comes  to  us  fragrant  with  the 
memory  of  myriads  of  faithful  souls  ? 

^  Behind  liturgical  prayer  lies  the  wisdom,  the  piety,  the 
dignity  of  the  whole  Church  :  the  congregation  can  depend  upon 
"  comeliness  and  order  ".  This  is  by  no  means  so  certain  where 
prayer  is  free.      In  a  church  in  which  free  prayer   holds,  the 

1 H.  Martensen,  Christian  Ethics,  i.  181. 

»  The  Life  of  Frederick  Denison  Maurice,  i.  430. 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  437 

congregation  is  absolutely  at  the  mercy  of  the  leader.  If  he  be 
a  man  of  piety  and  culture,  he  can  speak  and  pray  to  the  edifying 
of  the  church  ;  and  in  his  prayer  there  may  be  a  warmth  of  per- 
sonal feeling  and  a  ring  of  personal  conviction  which  are  apt  to 
be  lacking  in  the  more  impersonal  prayers  of  a  liturgy.  But 
what  if  he  be  a  man  of  bad  taste,  of  little  culture,  a  man  with  no 
sense  of  the  serious  dignity  which  ought  to  mark  the  worship  of 
the  Most  High  God  ?  And  not  only  the  speaker's  education,  but 
even  his  temperament  and  the  condition  of  his  health  will  affect 
the  nature  of  the  prayers  he  offers.  He  will  not  always  be  able 
to  say  the  thing  he  would.  He  may  be  dull  or  depressed,  and 
this  mood  may  be  reflected  in  his  prayers  ;  or — especially  in  his 
earlier  efforts — he  may  suffer  from  nervousness  or  temporary  loss 
of  memory,  and  this  may  easily  disturb  the  devotional  temper  of 
the  congregation.  Public  prayer  is  attended  by  all  the  difficulties 
that  beset  public  speech  generally.  Only  men  of  great  natural 
gift,  wide  reading,  and  much  experience,  can  address  their 
fellows  extempore  in  language  that  is  really  noble  and  graceful ; 
and  though,  in  the  moment  of  prayer,  feeling  may  be  more  ex- 
alted, and  a  man  may  express  a  better  and  deeper  self  than  he 
can  in  the  more  critical  atmosphere  of  a  public  meeting,  it  does 
not  follow  that  his  exaltation  will  exempt  him  from  idiosyncrasies 
and  errors  due  to  inexperience,  temperament,  or  the  state  of  his 
health.  A  liturgy  affords  an  absolute  safeguard  in  cases  of  this 
kind.  The  speaker  may  be  depressed,  but  the  prayer  will  not 
suffer ;  for  it  is  not  so  much  he  that  prays  as  the  Church  that 
prays  in  him,  and  her  noble  words  may  cheer  and  strengthen  not 
only  the  congregation  but  himself.  He  may  be  nervous  when 
he  faces  the  people,  and  his  thoughts  may  swim  away  from  him  ; 
but  the  prayer  is  not  impoverished,  for  he  says  the  thing  that 
needs  to  be  said.  As  a  protection  against  the  eccentricity,  the 
frailty,  and  the  inexperience  of  the  individual,  the  service  of  the 
liturgy  is  inestimable.^ 

2.  "I  suppose  no  one,"  says  Newman,^  "is  in  any  difficulty 
about  the  use  of  forms  of  prayer  in  public  worship ;  for  common 
sense  almost  will  tell  us  that,  when  many  are  to  pray  together 
as  one  man,  if  their  thoughts  are  to  go  together,  they  must 
agree  beforehand  what  is  to  be  the  subject  of  their  prayers,  nay, 
what  the  words  of  their  prayers,  if  there  is  to  be  any  certainty, 
composure,  ease,  and  regularity  in  their  united  devotions.     To 

^T.  E.  McFadyen,  Tlie-  Prayers  of  the  Bible,  226. 
^Parochial  and  Plain  Sermons^  i.  269. 


438    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

be  present  at  extempore  prayer  is  to  hear  prayers.  Nay,  it 
might  happen,  or  rather  often  would  happen,  that  we  did  not 
understand  what  was  said  ;  and  then  the  person  praying  is 
scarcely  praying  *  in  a  tongue  understanded  of  the  people  '  (as  our 
Article  expresses  it) ;  he  is  rather  interceding  for  the  people 
than  praying  with  them  and  leading  their  worship."  He  gives 
the  following  reasons : — 

(1)  Prayers  framed  at  the  moment  are  likely  to  become 
irreverent.  Let  us  consider,  for  a  few  moments  before  we  pray, 
into  whose  presence  we  are  entering — the  presence  of  God. 
What  need  we  have  of  humble,  sober,  and  subdued  thoughts,  as 
becomes  creatures  sustained  hourly  by  His  bounty ;  as  becomes 
lost  sinners  who  have  no  right  to  speak  at  all,  but  must  submit 
in  silence  to  Him  who  is  holy ;  and  still  more  as  grateful  servants 
of  Him  who  bought  us  from  ruin  at  the  price  of  His  own  blood ; 
meekly  sitting  at  His  feet  like  Mary  to  learn  and  to  do  His  will, 
and,  like  the  penitent  at  the  great  man's  feast,  quietly  adoring 
Him,  and  doing  Him  service  without  disturbance,  washing  His 
feet  (as  it  were)  with  our  tears,  and  anointing  them  with  precious 
ointment,  as  having  sinned  much  and  needing  a  large  forgiveness. 
Therefore,  to  avoid  the  irreverence  of  many  or  unfit  words  and 
rude  half -religious  thoughts,  it  is  necessary  to  pray  from  book  or 
memory,  and  not  at  random. 

(2)  In  the  next  place,  forms  of  prayer  are  necessary  to  guard 
us  against  the  irreverence  of  wandering  thoughts.  If  we  pray 
without  set  words  (read  or  remembered),  our  minds  will  stray 
from  the  subject ;  other  thoughts  will  cross  us,  and  we  shall 
pursue  them ;  we  shall  lose  sight  of  the  presence  of  Him  whom 
we  are  addressing.  This  wandering  of  mind  is  in  good  measure 
prevented,  under  God's  blessing,  by  forms  of  prayer.  Thus  a  chief 
use  of  them  is  that  of  fixing  the  attention. 

(3)  Next,  they  are  useful  in  securing  us  from  the  irreverence 
of  excited  thoughts.  And  here  there  is  room  for  saying  much  ; 
for,  it  so  happens,  forms  of  prayer  are  censured  for  the  very 
circumstance  about  them  which  is  their  excellence.  They  are 
accused  of  impeding  the  current  of  devotion,  when,  in  fact,  that 
(so  called)  current  is  in  itself  faulty,  and  ought  to  be  checked. 
And  those  persons  (as  might  be  expected)  are  most  eager  in  their 
opposition  to  them  who  require  more  than  others  the  restraint  of 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  439 

them.  This  is  an  especial  use  of  forms  of  prayer,  when  we  are 
in  earnest,  as  we  ought  always  to  be,  viz.,  to  keep  us  from  self- 
willed  earnestness,  to  still  emotion,  to  calm  us,  to  remind  us  what 
and  where  we  are,  to  lead  us  to  a  purer  and  serener  temper,  and 
to  that  deep  unruffled  love  of  God  and  man  which  is  really  the 
fulfilling  of  the  law,  and  the  perfection  of  human  nature. 

^  My  father,  in  theory,  held  that  a  mixture  of  formal,  fixed 
prayer,  in  fact,  a  liturgy,  along  with  extempore  prayer,  was  the 
right  thing.  As  you  observe,  many  of  his  passages  in  prayer, 
all  who  were  in  the  habit  of  hearing  him  could  anticipate,  such 
as  "the  enlightening,  enlivening,  sanctifying,  and  comforting 
influences  of  the  good  Spirit,"  and  many  others.  One  in  especial 
you  must  remember ;  it  was  only  used  on  very  solemn  occasions, 
and  curiously  unfolds  his  mental  peculiarities ;  it  closed  his 
prayer — "  And  now,  unto  Thee,  O  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost, 
the  one  Jehovah  and  our  God,  we  would — as  is  most  meet — with 
the  Church  on  earth  and  the  Church  in  heaven,  ascribe  all  honour 
and  glory,  dominion  and  majesty,  as  it  was  in  the  beginning,  is 
now,  and  ever  shall  be,  world  without  end,  Amen  ".  Nothing 
could  be  liker  him  than  the  interjection,  "as  is  most  meet".^ 

IF  A  great  prayer  which  has  been  transmitted  to  us  by  our 
forefathers  is  vastly  more  than  a  chance  collection  of  sounds  or 
symbols ;  it  is  the  expression  of  the  highest  moments  of  a  holy 
life  lived  on  earth,  concentrated  into  a  few  lines  of  printed 
matter,  but  the  outcome  of  his  best  experience  in  the  noblest 
activity  of  which  a  human  being  is  capable,  viz.  communing  with 
God;  and  so  it  is  the  ultimate  translation,  intelligible  to  us, 
of  things  which  cannot  be  uttered. ^ 

IT  We  value,  with  a  gratitude  which  we  cannot  measure,  all 
that  is  best  in  the  older  prayers  in  the  Greek  and  Roman  Lit- 
urgies and  their  many  children ;  but  we  frankly  recognize  that 
the  universe  in  which  we  modern  men  live  is  a  bigger  universe  than 
that  of  our  fathers,  bigger  in  knowledge,  feeling,  and  all  that  we 
mean  by  experience.  Our  God  is  a  bigger  God,  and  the  need  of 
God — a  need  to  be  expressed  in  prayer — under  modern  conditions 
is  greater  than  it  was  in  former  days.  Our  conception  of  God, 
Creator,  Omnipotent,  Omniscient,  Redeemer,  Guide,  Sanctifier, 
Judge,  Destiny,  is  far  larger  than  it  possibly  could  have  been  to 
men  of  previous  ages.     We  need  to  embody  all  this  in  our  prayer.^ 

1  Dr.  John  Brown,  BorcB  SubsecivcB,  ii.  106. 

2E.  Lyttelton,  Studies  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  234. 

3  T.  Wilson,  In  His  Name,  4. 


440    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

m. 

The  Length. 

If  Scripture  is  silent  as  to  our  posture  in  prayer,  equally  silent 
is  it  regarding  the  length  to  which  our  prayers  should  extend. 
This  certainly  is  not  a  trivial  point.  A  man  may  well  suspect 
that  there  is  something  seriously  wrong  if  his  business  at  the 
throne  of  grace  never  requires  more  than  a  few  brief  moments. 
Yet  you  will  seek  through  your  Bible  in  vain  for  any  direction 
as  to  how  long  you  ought  to  continue  in  prayer.  The  reason  is 
obvious.  The  length  of  our  devotions — to  speak  especially  of 
private  prayer,  for  in  social  prayer  other  considerations  must  also 
be  taken  into  account — ought  to  vary  according  to  circumstances. 
In  some  circumstances  an  hour  may  be  quite  too  short ;  in  others 
five  minutes  may  be  quite  too  long.  And  accordingly  the  Scrip- 
ture does  not  hamper  us  with  any  unbending  rule. 

1.  Biblical  prayers  are  usually  short — very  much  shorter  than 
the  average  modern  prayer.  The  very  earnest  prayer  of  Hezekiah 
for  deliverance  from  Sennacherib  could  easily  be  spoken  in  less 
than  a  minute  and  a  half;  and  the  beautiful  thanksgiving  of  David, 
in  1  Chron.  xxix.  10-19,  in  between  three  and  four  minutes. 
But  most  of  the  prayers  are  much  shorter  than  this ;  and  the 
teaching  and  practice  of  Jesus  go  to  confirm  the  impression  that 
the  ideal  prayer  is  short. 

IT  Many  public  prayers  are  undoubtedly  much  too  long.  The 
so-called  "  long  prayer  "  in  Scotland  has  little  Biblical  sanction. 
In  essence  the  long  prayer  is  a  heathen  prayer :  your  Father 
knoweth  what  things  ye  have  need  of.^ 

IT  Long  prayers  have  always  been  unsuited  to  my  temperament. 
The  longer  they  are  the  harder  I  have  always  found  it  to  derive 
anything  of  value  from  them.  As  a  boy  I  was  accustomed,  and 
well  able,  to  sleep  as  peacefully  through  the  various  groups  of 
prayers  at  the  services  I  had  to  attend,  and  yet  wake  exactly  as 
the  rest  rose  from  their  knees,  as  I  have  known  some  men  able  to 
take  exactly  forty  winks  after  dinner  and  no  more.  I  shall  carry 
to  my  grave  gratitude  to  D.  L.  Moody,  who  led  me  to  stay  and 
listen  to  his  message  by  calling  on  his  audience  to  sing  a  hymn 

»  J.  E,  McFadyen,  The  Prayers  of  the  Bible,  208, 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  441 

while  a  long-winded  brother  should  finish  his  prayer,  the  duration 
of  which  was  actually  at  that  moment  driving  me  out  of  the 
building.  In  short,  it  seems  to  me  that  the  more  keenly  I  want 
a  thing  the  briefer  my  form  of  petition,  and  the  more  directly  I 
come  to  the  point. ^ 

(1)  A  short  prayer  will  be  more  likely  than  a  long  one  to 
concentrate  itself  upon  the  matter  in  hand.  In  the  prayer  of 
Hezekiah  after  a  simple  ascription  of  praise  to  Jehovah  as  the 
only  God  and  the  Creator,  the  king  at  once  makes  his  request : 
"  Hear  the  words  of  Sennacherib,  wherewith  he  hath  sent  him  to 
defy  the  living  God.  .  .  .  Now  save  us,  I  beseech  thee,  out  of 
his  hand," 

(2)  Besides  securing  concentration,  brevity  has  the  further 
advantage  of  keeping  the  speaker  in  mind  of  the  elementary  fact, 
which  some  speakers  appear  to  forget,  that  prayer  is  an  address 
to  God.  There  are  some  who  habitually  speak  of  God  in  the 
third  person.  The  motive  might  conceivably  be  one  of  reverence, 
though  this  was  certainly  not  how  Jesus  taught  His  disciples  to 
pray.  In  other  cases,  the  habit  may  be  unconsciously  produced 
by  the  influence  of  preaching,  in  which  God  is  spoken  of,  not  to. 
Prayer  addressed  to  God  in  the  third  person  is,  in  reality,  devout 
meditation — an  excellent  thing  in  its  way,  and  not  far  removed 
from  prayer,  but  not  to  be  confused  with  it.  Occasionally  the 
third  person  appears  in  Hebrew  prayer,  but,  except  in  the  Psalms, 
it  is  seldom  sustained  for  any  length  of  time ;  its  place  is  usually 
at  once  taken  by  a  second  person.  Take  the  prayer  of  Jacob  for 
example  :  "  If  God  will  be  with  me,  and  will  keep  me  .  .  .  of  all 
that  thou  shalt  give  me  I  will  surely  give  the  tenth  unto  thee  ". 
Or  of  Solomon  :  "  Will  God  in  very  deed  dwell  on  the  earth  ? 
Behold,  heaven  and  the  heaven  of  heavens  cannot  contain  thee." 
Or  of  Daniel:  "  Jehovah  our  God  is  righteous  in  all  his  works 
which  he  doeth,  and  we  have  not  obeyed  his  voice.  And  now, 
O  Lord  our  God,  that  hast  brought  thy  people  forth  out  of  the 
land  of  Egypt."  Similarly,  a  man  may  refer  to  himself  in  the 
same  sentence  in  the  third  person  and  in  the  first :  "  Thy  servant 
doth  know  that  I  have  sinned  ". 

IF  How  much  prayer  will  really  profit  the  life  must  depend  on 
the  character,  the  training,  and  the  circumstances  of  individuals  : 

'  W.  T.  Grenfell,  ImmarialUy,  58. 


442     CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

we  must  not  fall  into  the  fallacy  of  supposing  that  because  a 
certain  amount  of  food  or  medicine  will  produce  a  certain  effect, 
twice  the  amount  of  it  will  produce  twice  the  effect.^ 

IF  The  depressing  power  of  long  prayers  is  vividly  shown  in 
the  Life  of  John  Hunt,  the  Fijian  missionary.  One  day  when 
steam  was  up  in  the  morning  in  the  steam-launch,  and  all  was 
ready  for  taking  up  the  anchor,  the  missionary  said,  * '  We  must 
have  morning  worship  before  we  start ".  After  reading  a  psalm 
he  called  upon  a  local  preacher  to  lead  in  prayer,  who  prayed 
very  earnestly  for  nearly  twenty  minutes.  When  he  had  risen 
from  his  knees  the  native  engineer  looked  at  the  steam-gauge  and 
said  quietly,  **  That  brother  has  prayed  forty  pounds  pressure  off 
the  boiler.  We  shall  have  to  make  it  up  again  before  we  start." 
At  the  next  weekly  prayer-meeting  all  were  warned  against  long 
prayers,  which  lowered  the  pressure  of  steam  or  decreased  the 
spiritual  power  of  united  supplication.^ 

2.  But  the  prayer  may  be  too  short.  In  the  prayer  of  con- 
fession, for  example,  there  must  be  time  for  thinking  about  our 
past  life  and  our  present,  for  that  comparing  of  ourselves  with 
the  Divine  ideal  of  human  Hfe  which  is  called  self-examination. 
And  after  self-examination  must  come  resolution — definite  resolu- 
tion that  we  will  try  to  avoid  the  sins  of  which  we  have  been 
reminded,  to  do  the  things  which  we  beHeve  to  be  our  duty,  to 
cultivate  the  qualities  of  character  and  the  habits  of  life  which 
we  know  we  must  want.  This  also  there  must  be  in  our  prayers 
if  there  is  to  be  reality  in  the  petition,  "  Deliver  us  from  evil  ". 
But  if  our  prayers  should  be  longer  than  they  are  apt  to  be,  it  is 
not  so  much  that  there  may  be  more  words,  as  that  there  may  be 
more  silence,  more  thought — time  enough  to  realize  that  we  are 
in  the  presence  of  God ;  time  enough  to  think  of  our  sins,  that  we 
may  repent  of  them;  of  our  temptations,  that  we  may  fight  against 
them ;  of  our  neighbours,  that  we  may  serve  them :  of  our  duties, 
that  we  may  do  them. 

IT  Why  is  long-continued  prayer  so  necessary  ?  In  order  that 
we  may  warm  our  cold  hearts,  and  soften  our  hard  hearts.  Be 
sure  of  this,  in  spite  of  all  sophistry,  that  time  and  labour  are 
needed  to  soften  and  warm  the  heart.     The  Kingdom  of  Heaven 

1  Hastings  Rashdall,  Christus  in  Ecclesia,  162, 

2  J,  Nettleton,  John  Hunt,  70. 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  443 

suffereth  violence,  and  the  violent  take  it  by  force.  Our  Father 
knoweth  what  things  we  have  need  of  before  we  ask  them.  But 
we  do  not  know:  and  never  will  know  but  by  much  prayer. 
This  is  experience,  as  all  men  of  prayer  will  testify.^ 

^  In  his  Life  of  Cromwell,  Lord  Morley  makes  the  following- 
quotation  from  the  Minutes  of  the  Westminster  Assembly  of 
Divines:  "After  Dr.  Twisse  had  begun  with  a  brief  prayer,  Mr. 
Marshall  prayed  large  two  hours  most  divinely.  After,  Mr. 
Arrowsmith  preached  one  hour,  then  a  psalm,  thereafter  Mr.  Vines 
prayed  nearly  two  hours,  and  Mr.  Palmer  preached  one  hour,  and 
Mr.  Seaman  prayed  near  two  hours,  then  a  psalm.  After,  Mr. 
Henderson  brought  them  to  a  short,  sweet  conference  of  the 
heart  confessed  in  the  assembly,  and  other  seen  faults  to  be 
remedied,  and  the  convenience  to  preach  against  all  sects,  especi- 
ally baptists  and  antinomians."  These  prodigies  of  physical 
endurance  in  spiritual  exercises  were  common  in  those  days. 
Johnston  of  Warriston,  intending  to  spend  an  hour  or  two  in 
prayer,  once  carried  his  devotions  from  six  in  the  morning  until 
he  was  amazed  by  the  bells  ringing  at  eight  in  the  evening.^ 

%  At  the  time  when  we  resided  together  in  the  same  house  at 
Perth,  Dr.  Duncan,  one  day  when  conducting  family  worship, 
prayed  at  very  great  length.  Apprehensive  that  he  had  en- 
croached on  other  duties,  he  thought  that  some  sort  of  apology 
was  necessary.  With  a  look  of  a  child  who  has  committed  a 
fault,  or  rather  with  the  same  look  which  I  have  often  seen  him 
exhibit  when  he  had  needlessly  lingered  over  some  work  to  the 
inconvenience  of  others,  after  rising  from  his  knees,  he  said,  "  I 
fear  I  have  been  very  long  to-day,  but  when  one  thinks  he  has 
got  in,  it  is  very  difficult  to  get  out  again  ".  His  prayers  were 
frequently  lengthy  from  an  opposite  cause,  because  he  failed  to 
find  access.  The  great  length  of  his  sermons  was  usually  due  to 
both  causes  combined ;  the  first  part  being  prolonged,  to  use  his 
own  expression,  by  the  difficulty  of  getting  in,  and  the  second  by 
the  equal  difficulty  of  getting  out.^ 

IV. 

The  Voice. 

"True  prayer,"  says  St.  Gregory  the  Great,  "is  not  to  be 
found  in  the  words  of  the  mouth,  but  in  the  thoughts  of  the 

1  Father  John  of  tJie  Greek  Church,  by  A.  Whyte,  64. 

2  John  Morley,  Oliver  Cromwell,  163. 

■^  A.  Moody  Stuart,  Becollections  of  the  Late  John  Duncan,  194, 


444    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

heart.     The  voices  that  reach  the  ears  of  God  are  not  words  but 
desires."  ^ 

1.  Prayer,  then,  is  not  an  affair  of  words,  but  an  action  of  the 
internal  spirit.  Words  are  but  an  imperfect  instrument  for  the 
manifestation  of  the  deeper  movements  of  the  soul.  There  is  in 
the  action  of  true  prayer  a  great  deal  which  words  are  incapable 
of  expressing.  The  truest  word  of  prayer  is  the  interior  and 
spiritual  word,  that  word  of  the  spirit  which  consists  in  the  silent 
movements  of  the  soul's  desires  towards  God.  The  posture  of  the 
body,  again,  should  be  a  kind  of  silent  word  expressive  of  the  in- 
terior posture  of  the  soul.  Of  the  prayer  of  words  without  the 
prayer  of  the  heart  the  Almighty  speaks  with  indignation. 
"  This  people  draw  nigh  unto  me,  and  with  their  mouth  and  with 
their  lips  do  honour  me,  but  have  removed  their  heart  far  from 
me,  and  their  fear  of  me  is  a  commandment  of  men  which  hath 
been  taught  them"  (Is.  xxix.  13). 

Essential  prayer  is  the  desire  and  effort  of  the  soul  to  relate 
itself  and  all  its  interests  to  God  and  His  will.  It  may  find  ex- 
pression in  petition  or  in  worship  or  in  obedience  or  in  work  of 
various  kinds.  Now,  from  the  Divine  side,  this  attitude  of  the 
soul  is  the  only  thing  considered.  This  is  the  "  effectual,  fervent 
prayer  of  a  righteous  man"  which  **availeth  much".  To  it 
verbal  petition  adds  no  effectiveness,  and  the  lack  of  such  petition 
is  no  loss.  In  public  prayer  verbal  petition  is  necessary  to  guide 
the  thought  of  the  people  and  to  express  their  desires  and  sense 
of  dependence.  In  private  prayer  it  may  often  be  necessary  to 
fix  and  intensify  the  desire.  But,  in  both  cases,  the  essential 
thing  is  the  attitude  and  desire  of  the  spirit.  The  real  prayer, 
the  effective  prayer,  lies  in  the  latter  solely  and  alone. 

^  My  view  of  prayer  seems  to  be  fundamentally  different 
from  that  of  many  others,  for  I  never  have  considered  it  actually 
necessary  to  find  any  words  at  all  in  which  to  clothe  my  petitions. 
I  have  lived  a  life  so  irregular,  so  wandering  and  so  physically 
exacting,  that  I  have  been  unable  in  any  way  to  follow  the 
example  of  most  men  and  lay  aside  certain  fixed  times  and 
seasons  for  prayer  at  all.  A  doctor's  life  involves  irregular  day 
and  night  work,  a  sailor's  life,  as  master  of  a  ship,  does  the  same, 

1  St.  Gregory,  Moral.,  XXII.  xvii.  43. 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  445 

•A  travelling  lecturer's  even  more  so.  Thus  I  have  never  settled 
down  in  a  home  of  my  own,  and  therefore  it  may  be  that  my 
attitude  to  prayer  is  necessarily  unusual  and  unconventional.' 

•:  The  value  of  silent  prayer,  even  in  the  assembly,  is  coming 
more  and  more  to  be  recognized.  Somewhat  after  the  style  of 
the  "bidding  prayer"  employed  in  the  universities,  the  leader 
asks  for  prayer  on  behalf  of  specific  persons  or  objects,  and 
each  in  turn  is  commended  to  God  in  silence,  or  gathered  up  in 
the  Lord's  Prayer  simultaneously  repeated.  This  method  has 
been  adopted  with  excellent  results  at  the  Free  Church  Council 
Conference  at  Swanwick  recently.  It  has  the  merit  of  focussing 
and  riveting  the  attention  of  the  whole  assembly  in  one  intense 
moment  or  two  upon  the  one  object,  and  it  breaks  through  the 
stereotyped  methods  of  the  ordinary  prayer-meeting.  A  com- 
munity in  silent  prayer  experiences  a  great  influence,  and  we  may 
indulge  the  hope  that  the  Spirit  of  God  is  given  thereby  an  op- 
portunity to  work  upon  the  hearts  of  those  so  engaged.'^ 

If  Silent  prayer  is  far  more  sure  than  vocal  prayer.  Prayer 
uttered  is  only  valuable  as  it  is  the  outcome  of  prayer  unex- 
pressed.    What  every  one  hears  is  sadly  apt  to  be  lost  to  God.^ 

IF  How  it  profits  me  to  confess  unto  Thee,  I  have  just  said. 
And  I  do  it,  not  with  audible  words  but  with  the  words  of  the 
soul,  and  with  the  cry  of  my  thought,  which  Thine  ear  heareth.^ 

^  He  who  prays  must  address  God  as  though  he  were  in  His 
presence;  inasmuch  as  the  Lord  is  everywhere,  in  every  place, 
in  every  man,  and  especially  in  the  soul  of  the  just.  Therefore 
let  us  not  seek  God  on  earth,  nor  in  heaven,  nor  elsewhere ; 
rather  let  us  seek  Him  in  our  own  heart,  like  unto  the  prophet 
that  sayeth,  "  I  will  hearken  unto  that  which  the  Lord  shall  say 
in  me  ".  In  prayer  a  man  may  take  heed  to  his  words,  and  this 
is  a  wholly  material  thing ;  he  may  take  heed  to  the  sense  of  his 
words,  and  this  is  rather  study  than  prayer ;  finally,  he  may  fix 
his  thoughts  on  God,  and  this  is  the  only  true  prayer.  We  must 
consider  neither  the  words  nor  the  sentences,  but  lift  our  soul 
above  our  self,  and  almost  lose  self  in  the  thought  of  God.  This 
state  once  attained,  the  believer  forgets  the  world  and  worldly 
desires,  and  has,  as  it  were,  a  foreshadowing  of  heavenly  bliss. 
To  this  height  it  is  as  easy  for  the  ignorant  as  for  the  learned 
to  rise  ;  indeed,  it  often  comes  about  that  one  repeating  the  Psalms 

1  W.  T.  Grenfell,  Immortality,  63.  ^  j.  q.  James,  TJie  Prayer  Life,  177. 

3  R.  W.  Barbour,  Thoughts,  103.  *  St.  Augustine. 


446    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

without  understandin<;  them  makes  a  more  acceptable  prayer 
than  the  wise  man  who  can  interpret  them.  Words,  in  fact,  are 
not  essential  to  prayer;  on  the  contrary,  when  man  is  truly 
rapt  in  the  spirit  of  devotion,  speech  is  an  impediment,  and  should 
be  replaced  by  mental  prayer.  Thus  it  is  seen  how  great  is  the 
error  of  those  that  prescribe  a  tixed  number  of  orations.  The 
Lord  taketh  not  joy  in  a  multitude  of  words,  but  rather  in  a 
fervent  spirit.^ 

2.  But  if  the  Father  seeks  the  true  adorers  to  adore  Him  in 
spirit  and  in  truth,  why  do  we  use  vocal  prayer  ?  First,  because 
Christ  has  taught  us  to  use  vocal  prayer,  and  has  given  us  a  per- 
fect form  of  it  by  way  of  example.  Secondly,  because  as  members 
of  the  Church  we  owe  to  God  and  to  each  other  the  public  com- 
munion of  prayer,  as  well  as  mutual  edification.  Thirdly,  because 
vocal  prayer  is  designed  for  the  outward  expression  of  internal 
prayer,  the  prayer  in  spirit  and  truth.  Fourthly,  because  the 
words  and  signs  of  prayer,  especially  those  provided  by  the 
Church,  awaken  the  inward  mind  and  heart  to  apprehend  the 
light  and  sense  of  prayer,  and  move  the  affections  to  lift  up  the 
soul  in  prayer.  As  St.  Augustine  says :  "  By  words  and  signs  we 
are  more  keenly  wakened  up  to  holy  desires  ". 

The  united  supplication  of  heart  and  voice  especially  becomes 
those  who  pray  for  the  remission  of  their  sins.  The  prophet 
Hosea  says  to  sinful  Israel :  "  Take  with  you  words,  and  turn  to 
the  Lord ;  say  unto  him,  Take  away  all  iniquity,  and  receive  us 
graciously;  so  will  we  render  the  calves  of  our  lips".  The  calves 
of  the  lips  is  a  figurative  expression  for  the  sacrificial  offerings  of 
the  voice.  The  tongue  is  a  great  offender ;  it  should  therefore  be 
a  great  expiator. 

"  Take  with  you  words,"  says  the  Bible  (Hosea  xiv.  2),  when 
you  come  to  pray.  The  words  of  the  mouth,  as  well  as  the 
meditation  of  the  heart,  are  acceptable  to  God.  Our  Lord  Him- 
self used  words,  many  times  "  the  same  words,"  when  He  prayed 
to  His  Father.  He  also  taught  His  disciples  to  pray,  and  to  pray 
in  words,  words  repeated  in  a  stated  form.  Repetitions  are 
never  vain  so  long  as  they  are  sincere.  It  is  the  insincerity  of 
repetitions    that    makes    them    vain,   and    insincerity  renders 

1  Savonarola,  in  Savonarola,  by  P.  Villari,  112. 


THE  MANNER  OF  PRAYER  447 

all  prayers  alike  equally  vain,  whether  those  prayers  be 
forms  of  repeated  words  or  not.  There  are,  indeed,  occasions 
when  prayer  in  words  is  impossible.  In  the  street,  in  the 
market-place,  on  an  unexpected  emergency,  whenever  the  spirit 
flies  suddenly  to  God  for  counsel  and  support — on  all  such  occasions 
words  are  impossible.  There  is  no  time,  no  opportunity,  for 
words.  And,  therefore,  without  words,  the  unsyllabled  prayer  is 
darted  up  to  the  throne  of  God.  But  on  all  ordinary  occasions 
of  public,  domestic,  and  private  devotions,  words,  even  though 
they  be  but  whispered  words,  are  an  important  element  in  earnest 
and  eftectual  prayer.  Thinking  over  our  prayers,  without  actu- 
ally saying  them,  is  generally  nothing  better  than  a  kind  of 
spiritual  indolence. 

IT  I  rarely  allow  myself  to  pray  quite  silently  in  secret.  For 
mj'-self ,  I  find  the  wanderings  of  the  mind  very  much  limited  and 
controlled  by  even  the  faintest  audible  utterance  of  thought.^ 

![  Dr.  Worcester  tells  of  a  very  characteristic  instance  of  the 
necessity  some  men  feel  to  clothe  their  petitions  with  words.  He 
was  far  away  in  the  wilds  of  North  Newfoundland,  alone  with  a 
guide  who  to  him  was  a  stranger.  It  suddenly  occurred  to  Dr. 
Worcester  that  the  man  was  a  giant  in  strength  and  obviously 
poor  enough  in  circumstances  to  make  the  acquisition  of  a  kit  like 
his  own  very,  very  desirable.  After  lights  were  out  and  darkness 
reigned  complete.  Dr.  Worcester  was  stunned  to  hear  some  one 
cautiously  moving  around  outside  his  tent.  Crawling  to  the 
entrance  and  raising  the  flap,  he  was  able  to  make  out  the  figure 
of  his  guide,  which,  as  he  watched  him,  disappeared  behind  a  bush. 
To  his  no  small  alarm  he  soon  heard  a  conversation  being  carried 
on.  There  could  be  no  one  in  these  woods  but  some  companion 
of  the  guide's.  There  was  no  time  to  be  lost.  Seizing  his  re- 
volver he  crept  out  to  watch  what  would  develop.  Almost  im- 
mediately the  figure  of  the  guide  loomed  into  view  against  the 
light  of  the  last  embers  of  the  camp  fire.  He  was  kneeling  on 
the  ground,  his  hands  lifted  up  in  petition  to  God,  to  whom  he 
was  pouring  out  his  soul  in  prayer,  exactly  as  if  carrying  on  a 
conversation  with  a  friend  alongside  him.^ 

3,  The  prayers  of  the  Bible  are  nearly  all  spoken  in  a  loud 
voice.  Nehemiah  ofiers  a  silent  prayer  on  an  occasion  when  a 
spoken  prayer  was  impossible,  and  in  Hannah's  prayer  for  a  child 

1  Bishop  Moule.  "  W.  T.  Grenfell,  Immortality,  68. 


448    CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  PRAYER 

*'  only  her  lips  moved,  but  her  voice  was  not  heard".  As  a  rule, 
however,  the  worshipper  **  cries  with  a  loud  voice".  Often  this 
is  explained  by  the  nature  of  the  situation.  It  is  thoroughly  in 
keeping  that  the  Baal  priests,  who  gashed  themselves  till  the  blood 
spurted,  should  cry  aloud.  Oaths  made  or  praises  offered  by  a  crowd 
are  naturally  s[)oken  in  a  loud  voice,  and  a  speaker  who  is  praying 
before  a  large  assembly  also  has  to  exert  his  voice.  But  even 
private  prayers  seem,  as  a  rule,  to  have  been  spoken  loudly. 
This  would  be  no  surprise  in  the  case  of  so  rugged  a  figure  as 
Elijah,  or  in  the  first  fresh  enthusiasm  of  conscious  sonship ;  but 
even  Ezekiel  prays  thus,  as  he  lies  upon  his  face,  and  briefly 
pleads  for  '*  the  remnant  of  Israel ".  The  leper  whom  Jesus 
healed  glorified  God  with  a  loud  voice ;  and  with  a  loud  voice 
Jesus  and  Stephen  uttered  their  dying  prayer. 

IF  When  deeply  in  earnest  about, some  part  of  their  own  daily 
employment,  it  is  a  sailor's  custom  to  emphasize  his  diction 
rather  by  the  loudness  of  his  voice  than  by  the  multiplication  of 
words,  or  special  selection  of  language.  This,  too,  is  very  noticeable 
in  their  prayers.  The  majority  of  praying  men  get  louder  and 
louder  as  they  proceed  with  their  prayer,  and  eventually  shout  at 
the  very  top  of  their  voices,  so  that  one  can  even  tell  before  enter- 
ing the  meeting  where  the  crew  hail  from  by  the  intensity  of 
their  petitions.^ 

IF  At  the  close  of  prayer,  end  it  with  silence.  "It  is  in  that 
lingering  moment  that  my  Lord  comes  to  me."  - 

1 W.  T.  Grenfell,  Immortality,  67. 

'■'  J.  A.  Clapperton,  Culture  of  the  Christian  Heart,  20. 


ABBBUKBN  :  THK    UMIVEBBITY   PBE88 


For  the  encouragement  of 
attractive  and  accurate  preaching 


The  Greater  Men 
and  Women 
of  the  Bible 


EDITED   BY 

James  Hastings,  D.D. 


COMPLETE    IN 
SIX    VOLUMES 


'  The  interest  of  these  Bible  lives  is  inex- 
haustible, and  this  volume  will  enrich  every 
sermon  upon  them.' 

London  Quarterly  Review. 


T-l^     T       r'l     ADk^      EDINBURQH 
•     iX      1  •     V^L^rVIVlV      AND  LONDON 


^-   '4  29 


The  Greater  Men  and 

'The  proper  study  of  mankind  is  man.'  It  is  also 
the  most  interesting  study.  See  how  biographies 
pour  from  the  press,  and  how  eagerly  they  are  read 
and  discussed. 

Where  is  the  man  or  woman  to  be  found  so 
human  or  so  everlastingly  interesting  as  in  the  Bible  ? 
The  preacher  who  announces  a  course  of  sermons 
on  the  men  and  women  of  the  Bible  is  sure  of  good 
attendance  as  well  as  earnest  attention.  If  he  takes 
the  trouble  to  be  accurate  with  his  statements  and 
to  show  how  the  character  of  each  person  is  de- 
veloped, he  leaves  an  impression,  especially  on  the 
young,  which  will  never  be  effaced. 

Dr.  Hastings  has  prepared  a  series  of  volumes  in 
which  all  the  Greater  Men  and  Women  of  the  Bible 
will  be  dealt  with.  The  character  of  each  individual 
will  be  carefully  drawn,  the  leading  events  in  their 
lives  described,  and  every  feature  and  event  will  be 
illustrated  from  modern  literature.  Thus  the  past 
and  the  present  will  illustrate  one  another,  and  the 
great  principles  of  life  and  conduct  will  be  enforced, 
while  at  the  same  time  care  will  be  taken  that  the 
historical  facts  are  in  accordance  with  the  latest  and 
most  reliable  sources. 


Women  of  the  Bible 

Six  Volumes  will  cover  the  whole  Bible — 


Vol. 

i. 

Adam  to  Joseph 

Ready 

Vol. 

11. 

Moses  to  Samson 

Ready 

Vol. 

111. 

Ruth  to  Naaman 

Ready 

Vol. 

IV. 

Hezekiah  to  Malachi 

Ready 

Vol. 

V. 

Mary  to  Simon 

Autumn  1915 

Vol. 

VI. 

Luke  to  Titus 

Spring  1916 

SUBSCRIPTION  TERMS 
FOR  THE  SERIES 

If  the  Complete  Series  of  Six  Volumes  is  sub- 
scribed for,  the  set  will  be  supplied  at  the  low 
Subscription  price  of  Thirty-six  Shillings  net. 

SINGLE  VOLUMES 

Any  volume  may  be  had  separately  at  the 
published  price  of  Ten  Shillings  (subject  to  the 
usueJ  discount  given  for  cash). 


'  This  is  an  excellent  book  of  its  kind.  The  illustrations  are 
fresh,  and  they  are  well  chosen.  All  Dr.  Hastings'  work  is  done 
to  perfection,  and  we  wish  him  success  in  this  effort  to  make 
present-day  preaching  both  attractive  and  accurate.  ...  If  the 
series  maintains  this  high  level  its  value  to  Bible-class  teachers, 
as  well  as  preachers,  will  be  great,  and  its  success  assured.' 

Cburcb  Family  Newspaper, 


THE  VALUE  OF  THE  WORK 


—GUARDIAN— 

'This  book  is  intended  for  preachers,  but  may  certainly  be 
read  by  others  with  pleasure  and  profit.  Beside  the  direct 
instruction  given  in  the  text,  the  literature  of  interpretation, 
criticism,  and  archaeology  which  a  preacher  ought  to  know  is 
referred  to  systematically,  and  the  references  are  the  right  ones. 
The  book  is  workmanlike.' 

—BRITISH  WEEKLY— 

•The  book  is  a  treasury  of  homiletic  help,  and  contains 
material  for  many  sermons.  We  shall  look  with  much  pleasure 
for  its  successors.' 

—RECORD- 

*The  men  and  women  are  made  to  live  before  us,  and, 
although  modern  criticism  is  not  ignored,  it  is  not  allowed  to  run 
riot  with  the  history.  .  .  .  The  volumes  are  not  to  take  the  place 
of  clerical  study  and  to  dispense  with  sermon  preparation.  They 
are  to  help  preparation,  and  of  their  kind  they  are  the  best  helps 
we  know.' 

-PREACHER'S  MAQAZINE- 

*The  chief  characters  of  the  Bible  are  described  with  such 
fulness  that  no  sermon  upon  them  need  lack  apt  quotation  and 
illustration,  or  sound  exegesis.' 

,    —BRITISH  CONQREQATIONALIST— 

*This  work  is  sure  to  have  a  welcome  from  preachers  and 
students,  as  it  brings  much  that  is  vital  to  the  proper  under- 
standing and   "perspective"  of  character  of  Bible  men  aad 


A  Complete  Prospectus  with 
Specimen  Pasres  may  be  had 
::  on  application  :: 


T«     nr      r^l     ADI^     38  George  St..  Edinburgh 
•    «      1  .    V>Li/Ai\JS.,   Stationers*  Hall.  London 

Loadon  Asentt :  Simpkia,  Manhail,  Hamilton.  Kent.  &  Co.  Ltd. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 
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